At institutional scales, this sort of thinking can add up to things of real significance. For example: I'm a transport planner specialising in Personal Rapid Tr

At institutional scales, this sort of thinking can add up to things of real significance. For example: I'm a transport planner specialising in Personal Rapid Transit (PRT) systems[1]. 5 years ago, a certain large corporation took a very serious interest in building a campus-wide PRT system, funding extensive feasibility and engineering studies to that effect. The primary rationale for the system was value of time. When these high-value employees spend a significant amount of time hunting for places to park or moving around the campus on its internal shuttlebus system, that represents a substantial loss of value-creation. Thus a $360 million PRT system which saved each employee an average of five minutes per day would pay for itself in just a few years. The business case had other legs to stand on as well, but that was by far the most impressive item on the balance sheet. Unfortunately, before the scheme could come to fruition, there followed a series of unfortunate events -- including but by no means limited to the collapse of the world economy -- which convinced said corporation that an even more appealing way to optimise their employees' value creation was to cancel all capital expenditures and sack a few thousand people. And the rest is history. 1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_rapid_transit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_rapid_transit