What's the rush?

[Gone in 60]

I've been doing medical deliveries for about six months now. Everything we do is based on departure and arrival times as calculated by Waze. The delivery app uses Waze as the navigation and timing function, and the routing and arrival times are shared with our dispatcher and the pick-up and drop-off contacts live-time, so both know where I am and when I'll arrive. When I get an assignment, it shows me my calculated departure time to arrive at the scheduled pick-up location exactly at my pick-up time. When I arrive, I need to tap a button on my phone at the exact pick-up time to start a clock to calculate wait time. If I sit in a hospital waiting room for 90 minutes waiting for my package, we bill 90 minutes of wait time. There's a scheduled drop-off time, but that's a variable based on when I receive the package and get on the road.

So, every run is basically hitting a targeted arrival time, my ETA is constantly in view as I'm riding, and I've noticed something interesting. Speeding doesn't really buy any time. My average distance from home to pick-up is around 35 miles, and can be up to 60 miles. There have been times where I've gotten on the road a minute or two after my scheduled departure time for whatever reason, and have needed to make up time on the ride. I've never been able to pick up more than one or two minutes, no matter how fast I ride. Let's say I have a 60 mile ride and cruise at 70 - 75 mph. My arrival time stays steady and I don't pick up or lose any time. If I need to "buy" a minute or two, I can go 80-85 over the same distance, but can only gain one or two minutes. I haven't been able to shorten my arrival time by any more than that.

It's been hard to program myself to realize that going faster doesn't really provide any significant benefit.

 

[Pete in PA]

Are you doing those deliveries on the CB?It really has to be a long distance (100s of miles) to really save some time.

 

[Gone in 60]

Noooo... we've got a fleet of retired BMW police bikes.

 

[Pete in PA]

Noooo... we've got a fleet of retired BMW police bikes.

Well that's still OK.

 

[the Ferret]

Yea I notice that in the car on Google maps. Hustling really doesnt gain you much. Like you said 2 mins at the most. Not worth the aggravation or anxiety.

 

[E11even_Hunnit]

In my experience, nothing will really put a dent on an ETA outside of multiple consecutive minutes in the triple digits or close to that threshold. Not smart or recommended for a number of reasons but just a data point for the sake of this conversation.

I have to agree- rushing is usually just a stressful version of a fools errand 98% of the time.

 

[flynrider]

I was helping out a friend of mine, doing beta testing on various GPS navigation applications that she was working on. As such, I was always trying to work out ways to beat the app/s ETA. Over the course of a few years, the only thing I found that would significantly change the ETA was avoiding red lights at major intersections. Some of those intersections can have you sitting for 4 minutes or more. I got so that I'd be scanning a half mile ahead in order to time my arrival during a green light. It didn't always work in heavy traffic. If the route was largely freeway, there was not much to be done to get there significantly quicker.