James Robertson's remarkable commute

eeyore1954 said:
My dad had to walk barefoot in the snow 6 miles each way, uphill and into the wind, in the blazing summer heat to get to school.

ETA That was after he woke up at 3AM to deliver milk when he was 9. (This part of his story is true)
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:) Mine had to lick road clean wit' tongue and live in a shoebox ... [etc etc]
 
I think Marplots is right. It's a chance to make a real difference to an identifiable person. I chipped in a bit, just because of my interest in the Detroit deurbanisation phenomenon.

It it's a scam (I don't think it is) it's a remarkably elaborate one and it's only a token gesture anyway.
 
Rolfe said:
The story seems well enough researched to be true. Some people can manage on surprisingly little sleep, and he says he sleeps a lot at weekends.

The trouble with the bicycle idea seems to be that despite the distance he walks, most of his journey is in fact by bus. If he used a bike he'd have to cycle the entire distance.
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Not necessarily. I don't know about the Detroit area, but in Denver the buses have bike racks, and your allowed to bring a bicycle onto the light rail trains, so it's possible to use a bike for the parts of the trip you would otherwise have to walk.

OTOH, I suspect in Detroit snow and ice would make a bike impractical for a significant part of the year.
 
I believe there are two feet of snow lying in Detroit at the moment. And I think the snow-clearing is patchy because the city is so over-stretched. They have hundreds of miles of road, but so many missing houses and so missing ratepayers, that they simply don't have the funds to maintain the infrastructure.

He goes through Highland Park, which is one of the severe blight areas.
 
eeyore1954 said:
Call me a skeptic but I can't help thinking something about his story just doesn't sound right. I think it is the 2 hours of sleep a night for over 10 years.
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Well, he also sleeps on the bus rides and says he sleeps a lot on weekends. I don't have any trouble believing the story. What surprises me is that his employer apparently likes and respects him, but in 10 years hasn't adjusted his work schedule to line up better with public transportation and car pools. Part of his problem is that he's commuting in the wrong direction. He works in a factory; they must have other shifts, or they could create one for him.
 
CORed said:
Not necessarily. I don't know about the Detroit area, but in Denver the buses have bike racks, and your allowed to bring a bicycle onto the light rail trains, so it's possible to use a bike for the parts of the trip you would otherwise have to walk.

OTOH, I suspect in Detroit snow and ice would make a bike impractical for a significant part of the year.
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There is also the question of whether he actually knows how to ride a bicycle. Some people never learned, and age 56 is a little late to start.
 
Bob001 said:
Well, he also sleeps on the bus rides and says he sleeps a lot on weekends. I don't have any trouble believing the story. What surprises me is that his employer apparently likes and respects him, but in 10 years hasn't adjusted his work schedule to line up better with public transportation and car pools. Part of his problem is that he's commuting in the wrong direction. He works in a factory; they must have other shifts, or they could create one for him.
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D you think he would be in much of a position to negotiate?
 
Rolfe said:
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And the banker who often stopped to give him a lift is going to help him manage the capital fund he now has.
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Now THAT makes me nervous. I wonder what kind of fees the kind banker will extract. The guy's going to need a tax lawyer before anything else.
 
3point14 said:
D you think he would be in much of a position to negotiate?
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Maybe not, but not everything is a union/management battle. Sometimes employers treat employees decently because it's the decent thing to do, especially for someone that they say is a good worker.
 
I really like that he can get his kind of money. It pisses me off he will have to pay so much tax on it... Like he's some rich guy. Also, check out the high doners. People donated like 2 k. That's incredible.
 
Bob001 said:
Now THAT makes me nervous. I wonder what kind of fees the kind banker will extract. The guy's going to need a tax lawyer before anything else.
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The banker seems genuinely to like the guy. He saw him walking, regularly, and stopped to give him a lift. He went out of his way to take him all the way home when the weather was bad. He spoke of worrying about him.
 
Also. I think he's going to be donated a car. No sick days for 12 years. That's an employee right there.
 
Caper said:
I really like that he can get his kind of money. It pisses me off he will have to pay so much tax on it... Like he's some rich guy. Also, check out the high doners. People donated like 2 k. That's incredible.
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I'm happy for him, and I wish him luck, but I suspect his $10 an hour co-workers will be on him like vultures. They'll either want "loans," or they'll expect him to treat them to lunch and sodas in the break room, or they'll just sneer at every chance. The smart thing would be for this guy to have his banker friend put him on an allowance, so he can honestly say "The money's all tied up." His problems are a lot like a lottery winner's, except the money isn't really enough for him to never work again. I wouldn't be surprised if he uses his new car to find another job.
 
Bob001 said:
Why think that? Getting a job in Detroit is hard, and so is keeping it. Why would you think his employer would keep someone who isn't productive?
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It's kind of an old joke. Should have figured it wouldn't fly with this crowd. :D

Didn't you ever hear stories about people sleeping on the job at the various auto manufacturers factories in Michigan?
 
Here's a view only a couple of blocks up from where I think Mr. Robertson lives. It's pure urban prairie. The only remaining house is derelict and likely to be removed soon. It's hard to believe that was once a street with houses only feet apart down both sides!

https://goo.gl/maps/pE5pe

That house is a good example of how these things progress, if you look at the earliest view from six years previously. It looks neat, habitable and tended. But it's alone in an urban prairie, and these houses don't tend to survive.

https://goo.gl/maps/0ZlZ6

And yet, a similar prairie-like scene only one block from Mr. Robertson's area, seen again in 2007, is changing the other way.

2007 https://goo.gl/maps/Mw3Ha

2013 https://goo.gl/maps/uDkrV

There's some new build. People are moving back in. It may be that the area is really being regenerated. However I have read articles criticising some of the Detroit new build, firstly for being poorly planned as to which areas are being built on, and second for the design of the houses in relation to the historic streetscapes. So who knows.

Note, I'm guessing as to where Mr. Robertson lives based on the locations given in the article and the map that's with it. I'm pretty close, but there's reasonable housing and completely disastrous urban prairie within a two-block radius there.
 
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Howie Felterbush said:
It's kind of an old joke. Should have figured it wouldn't fly with this crowd. :D

Didn't you ever hear stories about people sleeping on the job at the various auto manufacturers factories in Michigan?
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or any job where you are supervising a machine that does the actual work really, plenty of time to snooze, and being productive is a non issue :)
 
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