-thumb-autox90-10361.jpg)
On Wednesday I headed to Boston for a meeting with the great folks from TMC at the Liberty Hotel, a location that I had not been to before, but figured it must be downtown based on the address. Traveling with me was my trusty Motorola Droid mobile phone that sports the Google Android software suite.
Upon arriving at Boston's Logan airport I would normally head to the cab line or head over to the Hertz garage for a rental car. A cab to downtown from Logan would normally cost $25 each way. A car rental for the day would be at least $100.
In any case, I always like to check out a map of my destination before submitting to a cab ride or getting lost driving myself through Boston, so I pulled out my Droid and using Google Maps, pulled up my destination address. Sure enough, the Liberty hotel is downtown along the Charles River and at the foot of the Longfellow bridge that goes to Cambridge. Hmm...I wonder how far that is?
Meanwhile the GPS in my Droid has figured out that I'm standing outside Logan airport and it offers me the choice of getting directions from where I am to the Liberty Hotel. So, I push the button to find that driving there is going to be a circuitous sequence of tunnel rides, lefts, rights and rarely a straight-through intersection. Ugh...driving there is going to be a bear.
Hey, what's this Bus icon on the Google Map do? Push it...and guess what? Detailed instructions on how to jump on the SL1 "Silverline" bus, take that to South Station, change to the Red Line train headed to Alewife and get off at the Charles/GHB stop, cross the street to the hotel. Time 30 minutes. Fare: $2 each way!
What? $2 to get to the hotel? And in less time than it takes to get a Hertz car out of their parking lot? I'm in. And sure enough, here comes the SL1 bus, right on time.
Round trip it cost me $4 instead of $50 in cab fares or over a $100 for a rental car and parking.
So, if you are looking for an excuse to upgrade your phone to a Droid...here you go. The ROI on this trip alone sure went a long way toward covernig the cost of the phone.
Oh, on last thought - by taking the bus/train, I dramatically reduced the carbon footprint of my trip and hopefully made one small contribution toward saving the planet.
In any case, I always like to check out a map of my destination before submitting to a cab ride or getting lost driving myself through Boston, so I pulled out my Droid and using Google Maps, pulled up my destination address. Sure enough, the Liberty hotel is downtown along the Charles River and at the foot of the Longfellow bridge that goes to Cambridge. Hmm...I wonder how far that is?
Meanwhile the GPS in my Droid has figured out that I'm standing outside Logan airport and it offers me the choice of getting directions from where I am to the Liberty Hotel. So, I push the button to find that driving there is going to be a circuitous sequence of tunnel rides, lefts, rights and rarely a straight-through intersection. Ugh...driving there is going to be a bear.
Hey, what's this Bus icon on the Google Map do? Push it...and guess what? Detailed instructions on how to jump on the SL1 "Silverline" bus, take that to South Station, change to the Red Line train headed to Alewife and get off at the Charles/GHB stop, cross the street to the hotel. Time 30 minutes. Fare: $2 each way!
What? $2 to get to the hotel? And in less time than it takes to get a Hertz car out of their parking lot? I'm in. And sure enough, here comes the SL1 bus, right on time.
Round trip it cost me $4 instead of $50 in cab fares or over a $100 for a rental car and parking.
So, if you are looking for an excuse to upgrade your phone to a Droid...here you go. The ROI on this trip alone sure went a long way toward covernig the cost of the phone.
Oh, on last thought - by taking the bus/train, I dramatically reduced the carbon footprint of my trip and hopefully made one small contribution toward saving the planet.
Leave a comment