Make the sun a tie-breaker

The sun rises roughly in the east and sets roughly in the west. If your home is east of your workplace, the morning drive is westward with the sun rising behind you, and the evening drive is eastward with the sun setting behind you — twenty-three separate conversations carry that, and it is the whole of the idea. It does not need to be across the city: one account says a mile east is enough, because the point is the direction you face at the two times of day the sun is low. Two conversations add that living north or south of work also keeps the sun out of your eyes for the main part of the drive; one account says a north-south commute puts the sun in the driver’s window both ways, and one caution says a side-window sun is its own strain, so one account suggests living north of work so that the sun comes in at the passenger window. Two accounts argue whether side-sun is better or simply different, and this page does not settle it. The sun’s rising and setting points move through the year — nearer north in summer, nearer south in winter at mid-latitudes — so the drive that is glare-free in October may not be in June; two conversations say the problem comes and goes with the seasons, and how to handle the weeks when the sun crosses from one side to the other is a gap in these conversations.

The accounts are divided, and the side that says no is large. Thirteen separate conversations say the sun on the commute is a small thing next to price, safety, schools and the length of the drive, and should not drive the decision; ten say a pair of sunglasses solves it cheaply and easily; and two say working from home, taking the bus or simply living with it beat moving house or turning down a job. Two conversations say the choice is a rare one — you live where the housing was — and six accounts say they live west of work through geography or plain bad luck; one account calls ruling out whole compass directions a sign of having money to spare. The side that says yes is smaller but not empty: two conversations say facing the sun on both drives is a daily, physical pain that hides traffic signals, one account describes headaches and eye strain, and one says that for a first-time buyer or a long commuter it is a real quality-of-life factor. The argument is rendered below, three accounts to four, and ten more single-conversation exchanges run the same way. Where they land, in the accounts’ own words, is a tie-breaker: when two homes are otherwise equal it is a good reason to prefer one, and when they are not, it is not.

In several places, the accounts say, so check yours. Four separate conversations say it fails for anyone on a night or early shift, because the sun is somewhere else when they drive — or not up at all — and one account says a second- or third-shift worker would want the opposite side. Three conversations say living east moves the glare rather than removing it: with the sun behind you it bounces off the number plates and bumpers of the cars ahead, and one caution adds rear windows and chrome, which the visor does nothing about; two accounts suggest polarised lenses for it. Two conversations say the geography may not allow it — on an east coast the east of work is the sea, and one account says lakes and refineries do the same job in other cities. Two conversations say that in some places the sun is rarely low enough at commuting hours to matter, and that in others snow on the ground reflects it and makes it worse than direct sun; three accounts say winter and snow are when it bites. Two conversations say it is seasonal anyway, with the sun up before or after the commute in summer and dark in winter. One account says living west of work means driving against the rush-hour flow both ways and saving time, and three accounts prefer that trade; two cautions say moving east could lengthen the commute, depending on the region. And one account warns that an east-facing house can come with a west-facing garden too hot to sit in on summer evenings.

Three conversations, with two more behind them, say that in the northern hemisphere the prevailing wind blows from the west, so a home east of a city centre or a factory sits downwind of its smoke. Two corrections in these conversations narrow that: one says the pattern holds only between thirty and sixty degrees north, not everywhere — a caution extends the same band south of the equator — and single accounts say it is reversed or irrelevant in particular cities because of a river, a coast or farmland. One contraindication says: if your lungs react to bad air, do not move downwind of a major pollution source — and that is a question about a specific source and a specific wind, not about a compass point. How to check the wind and the pollution near a particular address before you buy or sign is a gap in these conversations. The accounts also argue, city by city, about which side of a town is dearer or rougher, and contradict each other on the cities they name. This page does not rank any side of any town, and it would be wrong to: the reasons one side of a city costs more than another are history and policy, not the sun, and a compass direction says nothing about the people who live there.

Less than the reader with a free choice, and this is where these conversations are thin, so the gaps are named as gaps. Ten separate conversations say sunglasses, and that they are cheap; three accounts say ordinary sunglasses stop working when the sun is on the horizon, one says a hat does what the lenses cannot, and some say they cannot afford good ones. One account names polarised lenses and a folding sun visor as the practical tools. One account says light-reactive lenses are useless in a car, and this page checked it: standard ones darken in response to ultraviolet light, and a laminated windscreen blocks nearly all of it, so they barely tint behind the glass; some newer kinds respond to visible light and are sold for driving — ask an optician which yours are before relying on them. One caution says the glare off the cars ahead is worse than direct sun because the visor cannot reach it. And the safety line at the top is the one that costs nothing: when you cannot see, slow down, and stop if you need to. What is not in these conversations is the rest — windscreen treatments and tints, changing the route or the time you leave, what a cyclist, walker or bus passenger facing the same sun should do, and anything at all for a north-south commute. Those are gaps in these conversations, not things this page can answer.

Two things, both light. One account in these conversations ties a decade of driving with the sun on their left side to two skin cancers on the left shoulder, and one caution says long-term glare can harm eyesight. This page checked the shape of that claim. A 2016 study in JAMA Ophthalmology measured twenty-nine cars and found the windscreen blocked about 96 percent of UV-A on average while the side windows blocked about 71 percent, with only four of the twenty-nine above 90 percent — so the sun that reaches you through the driver’s window is less filtered than the sun through the windscreen. A 2010 study in the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology found that among patients in the United States, where the driver sits on the left, slightly more skin cancers were on the left side of the body than the right — about 53 to 47 — and proposed driving as a reason. Neither study tells you your risk, and this page does not either: it is one account and two studies, and a mark on your skin that changes is a doctor’s question whichever side of the car it is on. One account with astigmatism says low sun makes the commute unbearable regardless of sunglasses; specific advice for eye strain is a gap in these conversations, and a question for an optometrist.