Distance from home for all 632 published sunrises
- Nearest Sunrise
- 499 ft
- Avg. Distance
- 17.5 mi
- Furthest Sunrise
- 363 mi
11,065 total miles
This number, 11,065 miles, is certainly inflated. The true metric is miles from home, rather than miles traveled. For example, a week in Detroit required me to travel nearly 500 miles to get there, but once I was there, I was only traveling a few miles to sunrise.
However, it also doesn't calculate the round trip, or actual drive distance. The numbers you see here are as the crow flies (also known as the haversine formula), from my humble home to where the published sunrise photo was taken.
On April 9, 2020 I moved to a new apartment. And the data included reflects this difference. This move, now 650 feet from doorstep to toes in water, reflects the drop in average distance beginning in Spring 2020. All of this ties into a greater subject of traveling to and from sunrise, which is all part of the morning decision making, cost of executing this project, and ties into what makes the perfect sunrise experience.
Distance to sunrise by year
Avg. Distance | Nearest Sunrise | Furthest Sunrise | Total Miles | |
2019 | 22.8 mi | 1,149 ft | 363 mi | 8,335 mi |
2020* | 8.4 mi | 499 ft | 311 mi | 1,925 mi |
2021* | 14.3 mi | 624 ft | 141 mi | 272 mi |
2022* | 28.0 mi | 625 ft | 272 mi | 533 mi |
*Data is updated as I publish more sunrises |
Distance to sunrise by month
Avg. Distance | Nearest Sunrise | Furthest Sunrise | Total Miles | |
Jan | 13.6 mi | 1,889 ft | 242 mi | 760 mi |
Feb | 23.6 mi | 1,924 ft | 311 mi | 1,462 mi |
Mar | 19.8 mi | 677 ft | 352 mi | 1,171 mi |
Apr | 6.6 mi | 499 ft | 272 mi | 337 mi |
May | 15.5 mi | 645 ft | 225 mi | 870 mi |
Jun | 2.9 mi | 642 ft | 45 mi | 149 mi |
Jul | 36.7 mi | 620 ft | 304 mi | 1,801 mi |
Aug | 3.6 mi | 590 ft | 64 mi | 181 mi |
Sep | 18.1 mi | 646 ft | 222 mi | 904 mi |
Oct | 2.2 mi | 624 ft | 23 mi | 117 mi |
Nov | 59.8 mi | 643 ft | 363 mi | 2,870 mi |
Dec | 9.2 mi | 708 ft | 117 mi | 443 mi |
Further questions, improvements, and notes...
Ideally, I'd like to replace the haversine formula with a directions API to get a more accurate commute. For example, Marquette to Belle Isle as the crow flies is 363 miles, but driving directions is closer to 460 miles. However, there is a direct cost with that many calls to a directions API, and I can't take on any more project costs that aren't directly covered.
How much work will it take to add a parameter to the sunrises where I was traveling?
I would also like to make note if I walked or if I drove. It's pretty safe to say that almost all distances greater than 3,000 feet (or so) I drove rather than walked. Most of the longer walks longer than that are memorable enough, and few enough, that they could manually be tagged.
April appears to be an anomaly. The furthest sunrise is just 6 miles away, significantly lower than most months. It raises a question for me. Is it an uninspired month? Do I not like to travel in April? There's a lot more data to come.
October, on the other hand, is very simple to explain the drop in further distance. October is in the middle of the Fall Gauntlet, when I'm hustling with Plaidurday and especially Fresh Coast Film Festival, making it difficult to get far away for sunrise.
How does this apply to travel costs and expenses for the project? At 18 miles in one direction, that's actually a 36 mile round trip. That's a lot of time and gas.
There is a lot more data to come for 2020, but there is certainly going to be a drop in commute distance beginning in March when the COVID pandemic shut down the world. Like everything, the project took some pivots at that time.
I love these sorts of data breakdowns. If you like this sort of thing, I'd encourage you to support BugsyLand so I can lean in further.
2019 distance from home
Avg. Distance | Nearest Sunrise | Furthest Sunrise | Total Miles | |
Jan | 8.5 mi | 1,889 ft | 117 mi | 263 mi |
Feb | 2.0 mi | 1,924 ft | 11 mi | 55 mi |
Mar | 36.6 mi | 1,149 ft | 352 mi | 1,134 mi |
Apr | 1.8 mi | 2,364 ft | 6 mi | 55 mi |
May | 26.9 mi | 2,179 ft | 225 mi | 833 mi |
Jun | 2.9 mi | 2,328 ft | 7 mi | 87 mi |
Jul | 57.2 mi | 0.6 mi | 304 mi | 1,774 mi |
Aug | 5.4 mi | 0.6 mi | 64 mi | 168 mi |
Sep | 25.1 mi | 1,165 ft | 222 mi | 754 mi |
Oct | 3.2 mi | 2,071 ft | 23 mi | 101 mi |
Nov | 91.5 mi | 2,076 ft | 363 mi | 2,745 mi |
Dec | 11.9 mi | 2,344 ft | 117 mi | 367 mi |
2020 distance from home
Avg. Distance | Nearest Sunrise | Furthest Sunrise | Total Miles | |
Jan | 7.5 mi | 2,308 ft | 64 mi | 136 mi |
Feb | 48.0 mi | 2,427 ft | 311 mi | 1,391 mi |
Mar | 1.4 mi | 0.6 mi | 3 mi | 36 mi |
Apr | 0.4 mi | 499 ft | 2 mi | 8 mi |
May | 1.6 mi | 645 ft | 7 mi | 36 mi |
Jun | 3.5 mi | 642 ft | 45 mi | 59 mi |
Jul | 1.6 mi | 620 ft | 12 mi | 26 mi |
Aug | 0.7 mi | 590 ft | 7 mi | 13 mi |
Sep | 0.5 mi | 646 ft | 3 mi | 8 mi |
Oct | 0.7 mi | 639 ft | 3 mi | 12 mi |
Nov | 7.8 mi | 656 ft | 116 mi | 125 mi |
Dec | 5.0 mi | 1,012 ft | 54 mi | 75 mi |