From SSTI, Summer 2020
Major roads undercut safety benefits of highly accessible places
Posted on June 15th, 2020 in Accessibility, News, Outcomes, TDMTags: accessibility, land use, safety, VMT
By Chris McCahill In working with transportation agencies across the U.S., our team often faces questions about the role of safety in accessibility analysis. While we know the safety and comfort of streets clearly impacts access for people on foot or bicycle, the effects of accessibility on
“Spillover” effects reinforce VMT effects from transit and parking subsidies
Posted on June 1st, 2020 in News, TDMTags: parking, TDM, transit, VMT
By Eric Sundquist We know that employer-provided free parking tends to increase auto-commute trips and that employer-provided transit passes tend to reduce auto-commute trips. Research is less clear about the effect on vehicle-miles traveled (VMT), however, in part because we don’t know whether
Researchers look at the transportation future as the country reopens
Posted on May 18th, 2020 in Multimodal, News, TDMTags: COVID-19, road design, TDM, transit, VMT
By Robbie Webber As the economy recovers from COVID-19, how can we emerge with a better, stronger, and more resilient transportation system? Three recent reports analyzing the impact of the pandemic on transportation and personal attitudes toward transportation may offer some clues. Vanderbilt
Teleworking’s hidden environmental costs
Posted on May 18th, 2020 in News, Outcomes, TDMTags: TDM, VMT
By Eric Sunquist Because of the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent shelter-in-place orders, more Americans are teleworking. This has drastically reduced VMT and air emissions. Policymakers may be tempted to try to encourage teleworking post-COVID-19 in order to keep the traffic down and the air
Comparing the car travel of Millennials and Generation X
Posted on May 18th, 2020 in News, OutcomesTags: millennials, VMT
By Michael Brenneis According to data retrieved from the FHWA’s National Household Travel Surveys, in 2017 Millennials drove less than their Gen X counterparts did in 2001. A new study in the Journal of Planning Education and Research compares the 2017 VMT patterns of Millennials (birth year
California highway projects face review for induced travel
Posted on April 20th, 2020 in Accessibility, DOTs, News, Outcomes, TDMTags: CA, legislation, projections, VMT
By Eric Sundquist The implications of California’s SB 743 (2013), which is widely if somewhat imprecisely known as the “move away from level-of-service to vehicle-miles-traveled bill,” became clearer last week, as Caltrans issued guidance on which transportation projects will require
Planning for an uncertain future
Posted on April 20th, 2020 in DOTs, News, OutcomesTags: emissions, mobility, modeling, VMT
By Chris McCahill Traffic forecasts and other projections are often presented as a single line on a graph or number in a chart. But we know—now more than ever—that these predictions are full of uncertainties. The Sacramento Council of Governments (SACOG), for a new study in JAPA, puts hard
VMT ticks up again in 2019
Posted on March 23rd, 2020 in News, OutcomesTags: trends, VMT
By Eric Sundquist Driving mileage in the United States climbed by just under 0.9 percent in 2019. On a per capita basis, the increase was just under 0.6 percent. The VMT figures come from FHWA’s latest Travel Volume Trends release. The per capita figure is 2 percent below the peak historic
Impact of “new age” shopping behavior on VMT and the environment
Posted on March 9th, 2020 in News, Outcomes, TDMTags: e-commerce, GHG, VMT
By Saumya Jain With the constant increase in retail sales from e-commerce, there have been a number of studies studying the relationship between in-store and online shopping behavior and its impact on retail-related travel. Though few studies suggest that the relationship might be complementary,
The incompatibility of Vision Zero and VMT growth
Posted on February 24th, 2020 in Multimodal, News, OutcomesTags: crash risk, safety, Vision Zero, VMT
By Eric Sundquist The U.S. transportation field has tried many things to reduce traffic crashes, fatalities, and injuries: drunk-driving and seatbelt laws; in-vehicle safety improvements; wide, straight roads with crash zones; graduated licensing; and more. Yet traffic crashes still kill
