USA Today article cites new data showing drop in auto commuting
September 23, 2009By Sean Barry
A yearly census survey released Monday illustrates the continuation of a trend that started well before the recession: Americans are taking steps to reduce their dependence on cars, and are looking for other options for getting around. Rates of solo driving and car ownership are dropping, according to this story in the USA Today about new census data. The paper cites a census report showing drops in both Americans who drove alone to work and in overall car ownership.
Transportation for America communications director David Goldberg was quoted prominently in the article, a sign of the campaign’s growing influence in transportation policy. In the report, Goldberg points out that these trends cannot be explained by the recession alone.
Environmental consciousness and the appeal of living in urban centers also play a role, says David Goldberg, spokesman for Transportation for America, a national coalition that advocates reduced dependence on cars. “There have been trends of leveling rates of driving and increased use of public transportation which predate the economic downturn,” he says.
Younger Americans are also changing their perceptions – and the behavior – surrounding automobile use.
Some of the decline in car ownership may be driven by younger people putting off getting their driver’s licenses or buying their first cars, Goldberg says. “We’ve seen a cultural shift.”
Driving down in 2008, congestion down much more
July 8, 2009By Stephen Lee Davis
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| Interstate 24 Traffic Originally uploaded by Transportation for America |
Due to the impact of high gas prices, the economic slowdown, and a growing preference for public transportation and other options for getting around, congestion was down in 2008 over 2007, marking the first two-year decrease in congestion since the Texas Transportation Institute began keeping track in 1982. Today, TTI released their bi-annual Urban Mobility Report today on the state of congestion and traffic in the U.S.
Some key findings:
Travelers spent one hour less stuck in traffic in 2007 than they did the year before and wasted one gallon less gasoline than the year before. The differences are small, but they represent a rare break in near-constant growth in traffic over 25 years.
- The overall cost (based on wasted fuel and lost productivity) reached $87.2 billion in 2007 — more than $750 for every U.S. traveler.
- The total amount of wasted fuel topped 2.8 billion gallons — three weeks’ worth of gas for every traveler.
- The amount of wasted time totaled 4.2 billion hours — nearly one full work week (or vacation week) for every traveler.
One cause of the decrease in congestion is the same cause responsible for the lower numbers of highway fatalities — Americans have been driving less and less. Vehicle miles traveled (VMT) growth rates have been in decline since 2005 and in 2007, total VMT and per capita VMT actually decreased for the first time since World War II. High gas prices and the recent economic downturn have contributed to these declines, but VMT was actually in decline well before the shock of increased gas prices and the recession, and has continued to fall even as gas prices plummeted over the last year.
And while total vehicle miles traveled (VMT) went down just slightly, congestion is down much more significantly.
According to Feburary numbers from INRIX, a reputable traffic statistics service, just a 3.7% drop in vehicle miles traveled in 2008 resulted in a 30% drop in congestion in our 100 most congested metro areas. That means each commuter spent 13 less hours stuck in traffic in 2008 over the previous year. And in slight contrast to the TTI report, the report found that overall, “99 of the top 100 most populated cities in the U.S. experienced decreases in traffic congestion levels in 2008 as compared to the prior year.” Small reductions in how much we drive each year have a much larger impact on congestion.
| The best way to reduce congestion and help Americans save money, time and fuel is to get smarter about managing traffic and offer increased options such as public transportation, telecommuting and incentives for carpooling, bicycling and walking. There is ample evidence that shows that reducing peak hour traffic by just a small percentage will dramatically reduce congestion and all of the costs associated with traffic.” |
| — James Corless, T4 America |
There’s no doubt that the sagging economy had a hand in reducing how much we drive. But regardless of the current economy, most Americans seem to be looking for ways to drive less — not more. So what if we invested more in the positive ways to reduce the amount we have to drive by making other options for getting around accessible, convenient, and available to more people?
With public transportation ridership still going up — even as driving is going down — it’s clear that people who have choices for getting around use them. People are looking for other convenient ways to travel that can get them out of traffic and save them time and money.
And as the INRIX numbers show, if we can make it easier to get around and increase the options for doing so, everyone behind the wheel benefits as congestion decreases. (And despite the decrease overall, the current $87 billion in congestion costs isn’t good news, by any stretch of the imagination.)
It’s unquestionable that the recession has had an impact, giving us some momentary slack in congestion. But what will we do with the breather? When the economy begins to pick back up again and people start driving more, will we head straight back into gridlock? With driving down and public transportation up, will we make more investments in the kinds of transportation options people are clamoring for, the kinds of options that can reduce congestion and make travel more painless for everyone?
Or will congestion simply mount as the economy rebounds?
Breaking Down the Blueprint: Energy Efficiency and Energy Security
June 3, 2009By Andrew Bielak
| The T4 America Blueprint has six overarching national objectives to provide a new vision and guide our federal transportation policy. If our transportation system is in need of a clear purpose, these six objectives are like the rudder that will steer the ship. To ensure that we can meet these objectives and measure our progress, we created 10 performance targets — clear, quantifiable goals for the next 20 years that are tied directly to the six national objectives. |
In November 2008, President Obama described America’s dependence on oil as resembling a “shock and trance” cycle. Our growing demand for foreign oil, he said, creates skyrocketing energy prices, leading to dramatic calls for energy independence and sudden cutbacks in our consumption that quickly dissipate once the price of oil drops — beginning the cycle all over again.
Transportation for America believes that the push to make our country less dependent on oil begins with a smarter, cleaner transportation system, and for this reason we’ve made one our top national transportation objectives to promote energy efficiency and achieve energy security.
While we’ll talk later this week about the programs in our Blueprint that help us reduce our dependence on oil, we wanted to explain today why we have this national objective, why our transportation system has such deep effects on our country’s energy consumption, and what performance targets are linked to this goal. As you’ll recall from the previous posts in this series, our 10 performance targets are measurable goals that will help us ensure that we achieve our objectives. While nearly all of these performance targets are important to create a more energy-secure economy, we are including two here that are particularly critical as we look towards this goal:
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Today’s Headlines — 05/27/09
May 27, 2009By Andrew Bielak
- Not everyone is happy with U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood’s support for more transportation options and less overall driving. (thenewspaper.com)
- New York Times columnist Bob Herbert throws his support behind an infrastructure bank to help stimulate the economy.
- Decline in advertising sales causes more financial pain for New York City’s transit agency. (New York Times)
Transportation Secretary affirms smart principles for US transportation system
April 29, 2009By Stephen Lee Davis
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| National Bike Summit – Day two-8 Originally uploaded by BikePortland.org |
| DOT Secretary Ray LaHood speaks at the National Bike Summit in Washington, DC |
“Livable and Sustainable Communities.”
Those four words might not be at the top of the list of what one would expect to hear from the person in charge of how the federal government spends our tax dollars on all forms of transportation — ports, railroads, highways, interstates, sidewalks, bike lanes and more — but that’s exactly what U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood named as a primary goal for DOT while testifying before a Senate Committee yesterday (ahead of T4 America.)
In his remarks, he made it clear that DOT and the Obama administration see the deep connections between where and how we spend transportation dollars and the quality of life for everyday Americans.
One of the clear issues with our national transportation program since 1991 is that it’s been like a huge ship without a rudder — spending billions each year without any clear goals or vision for exactly what those billions should accomplish for us. Economic development? More travel options for everyone? Making transportation affordable and safe for all Americans?
After talking at length about the many challenges facing America, Secretary LaHood made it clear that DOT will be governed by some very clear principles in the future, including better quality of life as a goal for transportation spending:
With these great challenges it is essential that our transportation policies be framed so that we can meet these demands and at the same time be consistent with the major goals I have established for guiding the actions of the Department of Transportation: economic recovery; safety; and livable and sustainable communities will be the key organizing themes as we in the Department reformulate existing policies and develop new policy directions for the future.
You can download his full remarks from the committee web site here, (.pdf) but continue reading for a few select quotes:
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Highway deaths are plummeting — can we make the drop permanent?
April 7, 2009By Andrew Bielak
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| Aftermath of a fatal collision on Interstate 540 in Arkansas. Deaths from crashes like these were down nine percent in 2008 over the previous year. Photo by Steve Davis |
You’ve probably heard that Americans are looking to save money and fuel by leaving their cars behind in order to walk, bike and use public transportation in historic numbers. What you might not know about is one of the most important byproducts of this shift in travel demand and decline in miles driven — much safer roads, and far fewer highway deaths.
A new release from the Federal Highway Administration shows that in 2008, a total of 37,313 people died in vehicles crashes, a nine percent decrease from the previous year and the lowest overall level in nearly 50 years. That means that almost 4,000 fewer people died in car crashes last year than in 2007 — something that comes as a rare piece of good news in a tough economic environment.
Though certain states may be making concerted efforts to ramp up safety, no one can deny that the continued drop in driving, which is due to both the economic crisis and fluctuating gas prices, has a profound effect on the safety of our roads.
While these numbers are certainly something to celebrate, they should give us no reason to think that we don’t have much more work to do. One hundred Americans still died each day on our roads last year, and our existing set of local, state and federal policies are doing little to help improve that. That’s like a small commercial airliner full of passengers crashing each day. And it’s hard to imagine that we wouldn’t be shocked into action were that the case with airline travel.
That’s why Transportation for America is pushing Congress and the Obama administration to develop a comprehensive plan for designing safe, complete streets for all users, holding states accountable for reducing fatalities and injuries, and directing targeted efforts to vulnerable groups like seniors and people in rural areas.
Help us out by joining with others to send a message to Congress urging that they support the complete streets bills to make our roads safe, hospitable and accessible for everyone who needs to use them.
We drive less, but roads are still full, Chicago-area study says
October 14, 2008By Andrew Bielak
A new study by the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning shows that while total miles of car travel in the Chicago area has dropped by nearly five percent since last year, congestion in the region has managed to get worse. (Chicago Tribune — Jon Hilkevitch)
‘Pay as you drive’ rolls forward
September 3, 2008By Andrew Bielak
California’s insurance commissioner pushes a proposal to allow drivers to pay insurance rates that go up or down depending on how much they drive. (San Francisco Examiner — Tamara Barak Aparton)
The end of an era
July 9, 2008By Andrew Bielak
Graph from the U.S. Department of Transportation shows the impact of gas prices on Americans’ driving habits. (Grist)
30 billion fewer miles driven, and counting
July 7, 2008By Andrew Bielak
30 billion fewer miles driven, and counting
Seattle Times
Tony Pugh
Experts predicting a “wholesale change” in the way Americans commute.
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- Atlanta-area transit system 14 days from shutting down, 2 million rides disappearing
March 17, 2010 - U.S. Transportation Department makes good on promise to ensure our streets are made safer
March 16, 2010 - Obama’s livability programs help rural America too
March 16, 2010 - Transit grants out the federal door, but what about the cuts?
March 8, 2010 - Transit riders in Atlanta face massive cuts, “wholesale restructuring” of service
March 5, 2010
- Atlanta-area transit system 14 days from shutting down, 2 million rides disappearing
The United States of Transit Cutbacks
Driving is down and transit ridership is at record highs. Yet transit agencies across the country are considering layoffs, service cuts and fare hikes. Find out more and learn what you can do to help at t4america.org/transitcuts
Transportation: In your eyes
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