The I-95 detour commuter challenge

PHILADELPHIA - March 19, 2008 While our viewer took public transportation, I drove the same route to see who gets there first.

Andrea Devine lives in Northeast Philadelphia off the Boulevard and Cottman Avenue.

"I need to get to Old City. I work at 3rd and Callowhill streets. Normally, I leave my house at 7:30, 7:45 and make it to the office by 8:15, 8:30," Andrea said.

Due to the I-95 shutdown, it took Andrea three hours to get to work yesterday.

Today, she decided to take SEPTA.

"I'm not happy about it. It's miserable outside. I'm not sure how long SEPTA's going to take. I'm a little leery about that, too," Devine said.

While Action News producer Cheryl followed Andrea with a handicam to the bus, my photographer Gino and I start driving to Old City in the Action News van.

The question was - who will get there faster?

Once we got off 95, Aramingo was more like a parking lot. There was a lot of traffic on the detour at 7:11 this morning.

It took six minutes just to get through one traffic light.

However, once we finally got back on 95 at Girard, there were very few cards and it was smooth sailing.

Meantime, how did Andrea make out?

"The bus came probably within 5 minutes of me getting to the bus stop," Andrea said, "I got to the train station, there was a train there, hopped right on, got here, the train was not that crowded, and my walk was uneventful," Andrea said.

Gino and I arrived 45 minutes after we began our trip, but Andrea had already arrived. She beat us by only a few minutes, but says she now prefers public transportation to driving herself.