Transportation is an all important consideration both as regards time and expense.  There are beautiful countrysides fairly near large centers that are so hampered by poor train service as to be almost out of the question for the everyday commuter.  Of course, there may be an adequate service or it may be practical to drive to and from business.  The latter is not at all uncommon with the country areas near the smaller industrial centers.  Here the fortunate commuter is free from exacting train schedules; a five or ten minutes’ drive sees him outside the city limits, and another twenty or thirty may find him rolling into his own driveway.  Smooth sailing between office and home depend only on a reliable car and good roads.

One should make sure the latter are passable in the winter at all times.  For instance, are the Town Fathers liberal with the snow plow?  Can its cheery hum be heard even at midnight if a heavy fall of snow makes it necessary?  Does it come down the little dirt road where your modest acres are located?  These are questions all commuters should ask whether their journey cityward is made entirely by automobile or partly by train.  Further, whatever means of transportation are used, the monthly cost should be reckoned carefully.  It is one of the largest single items involved in this scheme of living in the country and working in the city.

There is also the question of food and other household supplies.  Granted one no longer expects to run around the corner for a loaf of bread or a dozen eggs that may have been left off the morning shopping lists, just how far away is the nearest grocer?  Is he at all receptive to the idea of making an occasional delivery in the outlying districts?  How about the rubbish collector, if any; the milkman; the purveyors of ice, coal and wood?  Are there a lighting system in the vicinity, telephone facilities, and so forth?  These last need not be deciding factors, all other things being equal.  They are simply matters to investigate.  It is then for the family to decide whether to do without any or all of them if necessary.

Besides in a wisely chosen location, these, though lacking at first, are soon added as the demand grows.  When we began our own experiment in country living, it was with difficulty that we got even a telephone installed.  Instead of electricity, our evenings were lighted by candles or kerosene lamps and our meals were cooked on an oil stove.  Grocers and other tradesmen didn’t even know how to get to the little area.  Yet within three years enough other people like us had moved into the vicinity to warrant extension of electric service through the neighborhood, and a milk route, rubbish service, deliveries of laundry, food, ice, and other household needs were soon added.  The Fuller brush man has for years known the way to our door and now even our Sunday newspapers are delivered, although we are six miles from the nearest news stand.