scattering and stats
andrew.mccluskey at bristol dot ac dot uk
navigating physics, chemistry, mathematics, and scientific computing
Another reason to travel by train
from: 2023-01-26In 2022, with COVID restrictions reducing, I found myself with a lot more work-travel travel. In the interest of being more environmentally conscious, and since I am now living in mainland Europe1, I decided to use the train as much as possible. There are also selfish reasons, of course, I enjoy train travel and have an interest in railways.
Source: www.openrailwaymap.org.
The result of this “year of trains”2 is that I enjoyed many days, and sometimes multiple days, travelling by train to different parts of Europe. And in addition to the ease of train travel, I have found an additional benefit, which I feel other “knowledge workers” (to borrow a phrase I don’t like from Cal Newport’s Deep Work) may be interested in. This is trains as a Deep Work space.
The idea of a Deep Work space is introduced in Cal Newport’s book, perhaps without using that term. This is a space that is conducive to working deeply – where you can focus singularly on the task at hand. And trains have allowed me to achieve this.
There are a few factors, that I think are contributing to this:
- When you are on a long train journey, there is essentially nothing else to do, which means it is easy to focus on a single self-contained task at hand (i.e. adding functionality to a software project or writing a paper or talk).
- You are stuck in your seat, a busy train means you might end up at a window seat without the ability to easily get up and walk about (unless you want to annoy the person sitting next to you).
- This is often a worry of others, internet on trains is good enough to access a quick stackoverflow thread without being so good that one can watch YouTube videos the whole way.
This is why, I believe that if a “knowledge worker” has some travel to perform and can define a self-contained task (that doesn’t require massive amounts of internet access), they should consider travelling by train. They can spend the time working productively, without the stress of the airport and with the confidence that they are helping the environment just a little bit.