Originally Posted by Elola

I'm solidly in the "fly whenever possible" camp. The time spent at the airport and on the plane can be productive time, whereas the time spent driving is just spent driving (unless you're one of those people who keeps their laptop on the passenger seat and works while driving)

I'm based out of ORD and take many "driveable" flights (IND, STL, MCI, MSP, DTW, CLE etc.) each year. For the purposes of my business, flying allows me to spend only one day at the site I'm visiting, saving my company hotel expenses. If I fly I can usually find a flight pairing that gives me 8-10 hours on site yet still gets me home by 9pm. If I drive those routes I'm either staying overnight or only on site for 4-5 hours and not getting home until much later than 9.

I do the same thing for leisure travel. My parents still live near MSP and I used to drive the 400 miles or so on holidays. I have no gas expenses thanks to my company's very generous vehicle policy so I figured the only expense was my leisure time. After a couple of $200 speeding tickets in Eau Claire County, WI (which targets out of state vehicles, IMO, but that's another story) I traded the "free" 6-7 hour drive for a $120 50 minute flight where I have a relatively decent chance of getting an upgrade to F through UDU and never looked back.