Comments on: Even as Gas Prices Fall, More People Are Turning to Transit

By: Jennifer Lindner

Jennifer Lindner — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 21:41:16 +0000

Nope, it’d make you suspect a “cure” was beginning to take hold…

By: Steven Higashide

Steven Higashide — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 19:25:14 +0000

Michelle is being a little too modest. Just to be clear, we did say that the data comes from Traffic Volume Trends when the article was originally posted. No incurable data geek would forget to cite a source so dear to her heart.

By: Michelle Ernst

Michelle Ernst — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 19:08:07 +0000

We should have cited our sources in this piece…the VMT data are taken from FHWA’s Traffic Volume Trends (http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/ohim/tvtw/tvtpage.cfm). This is one of my favorite transportation data sources (yes, I’m an incurable data geek).

Importantly, these VMT data are NOT derived from gasoline usage, but from “4,000 continuous traffic counting locations nationwide.”

This data is flawed in it’s own special way, but is a pretty reliable indicator of current national travel trends.

By: Jennifer Lindner

Jennifer Lindner — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 18:15:52 +0000

*one MORE person, that is.

By: Jennifer Lindner

Jennifer Lindner — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 18:12:47 +0000

Wish I’d read this before calling their offices, but perhaps the most important thing is simply that one person called on this side of the issue.

By: Larry Littlefield

Larry Littlefield — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 17:10:21 +0000

Nonetheless, at least in NYC as I recall transit fell first in past recessions and rose last in the booms.

That is, in the boom people drove until the traffic and parking was so bad they couldn’t take anymore, and then switched to transit. And in the bust, as some people could no longer drive, driving became easier, attracting others.

We’ll have to see what happened.

By: Komanoff

Komanoff — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 16:51:21 +0000

Yes, the recession is helping to suppress driving. But I would be cautious about inferring too much from FHWA estimates of VMT since they’re largely derived from data on gasoline usage and may not sufficiently account for changes in the fleet of on-orad vehicles.

Moreover, the “legacy” of the run-up in gas prices from Dec. 2007 ($3.07) to the July 2008 peak ($4.14) is having an impact on gas usage, alongside the recession. Some of the decisions made in response to that increase — switching to less-guzzling vehicles, rethinking the “need” to make so many car trips, etc. — are remaining in effect. I suspect, however, that one component of these changes — switching to transit — will tend to be swamped by the decline in transit use that ordinarily occurs in a recession as fewer people have jobs to commute to, shopping declines, etc. So I would be cautious about assuming any growth in transit in 2009.

BTW, the spreadsheet relating U.S. gasoline consumption to changes in gas prices and overall economic activity that I maintain and Web-post monthly may be of interest to hard-core quantifier-types on this list.