Gear range looks nice, with everything from a low 34-34 granny to a respectable 50-11 high gear (which is useful even bombing hills at 45mph).
The cassette achieves its wide 11-34 range by ditching the ultra-tight spacing on the high gears that comes on most road cassettes these days. If you mostly use the big chainring and switch to the little chainring as a bailout, this will likely be a complete non-issue unless you cruise at 20+mph. If it does wind up bothering you, you can always fiddle with the cassette later.
The stock tires are 32mm, which might not be as wide as what's on your hybrid. Depending on just how bad the bad roads and gravel are, you may find that you want something wider than a 32. But, if you decide you want to go wider, the switch would be very easy: the rims on that bike should be able to comfortably handle tires at least 44mm wide, and the frame supposedly has clearance for 48.
It will be a huge posture change from a Schwinn hybrid. If you're comfortable with the Anyroad, it should be a solid upgrade.
Depends on the finances. 5 hours a week isn't a tiny amount of time to put into an activity.
"Is it worth it" discussions on the internet are also generally a total mess, because the people participating vary from folks who would starve to death if they didn't find a $50 bike on craigslist, to millionaires who are barely aware of the $15,000 they dropped on the bike they spend 20 minutes getting coffee on twice a week.
We can usually only hope to weigh pros and cons of the product itself... Deciding final worth-it-ness is something only the buyer can really do.
I guess Jem also has a legitimate reason to be a weight weenie here; 200m is a lot of climbing for a short commute. He'll probably have to leave 20 seconds early to make up for those 2kg! Or more if he bottoms out his gearing.
