MANHATTAN, the summer of 1984. A hair-dryer breeze blew up Park Avenue as I left Grand Central Terminal, on foot, for my first real job interview, in my first pair of big-boy shoes. But by the time I got to my destination on 29th Street, my sweat glands had exploded and my suit had vaporized. I did not get the job.

In the intervening decades, antiperspirant technology hasn’t moved the needle much. And that’s too bad, because when it comes to the first/last mile—what experts call the distance to and from mass-transportation...