[sustran] Americans Are Driving Less, Washington Should Pay Attention

[Vinay Baindur]

 Americans Are Driving Less, Washington Should Pay Attention
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tony-dutzik/american-transportation-driving_b_962453.html

  Culture ,   Job Creation ,   Jobs ,   Transportation , American Driving
Habits , American Transportation , Driving Habits , Highways ,
Infrastructure , Infrastructure Jobs , Modern Transit , Public Transit ,
Politics News



A few years ago, a strange thing happened: Americans started driving less.

How strange was it? For 60 years, up until 2005, the number of miles driven
on America's roads increased by an average of 3.7 percent per year -- that's
more than twice as fast as population growth. Today, however, Americans are
driving just about as much as we did six years ago overall. And on a
per-capita basis, as researchers from the Brookings Institution have pointed
out, the number of miles driven actually peaked a decade ago.

As President Obama and Congress debate infrastructure investments -- both as
part of the president's jobs strategy and the ongoing debate over
re-authorization of the transportation bill -- it is important to know
whether the trend away from ever-increasing amounts of driving is real or a
temporary blip. If the trend is real, it would suggest that our
transportation policies -- the broad outlines of which were established when
"Leave It to Beaver" was on TV and America still produced most of its own
oil -- need a serious rewrite for the 21st century.

What do we know? First, we know that driving has fallen fastest among young
Americans -- precisely the people who will be most impacted by today's
transportation infrastructure choices. According to the National Household
Travel Survey, the average number of miles driven by licensed drivers aged
20 to 34 fell by 12 percent between the recession years of 2001 and 2009.
Meanwhile, the percentage of 19-year-olds with a driver's license has
plummeted from 92 percent in 1978 to 77 percent in 2008.

Some cultural observers suggest that these trends are part of a larger
generational shift -- one in which digital connectivity trumps horsepower,
and iPads and Androids take the place of an earlier generation's '57 Chevys
as symbols of consumer aspiration and freedom.

Other factors are at work as well. The easy mortgage credit that once
financed the construction of McMansions in auto-oriented exurbs is gone.
Consumer tastes in housing are shifting toward walkable neighborhoods in
proximity to urban amenities. A recent report by PricewaterhouseCoopers and
the Urban Land Institute projects that, "24-hour neighborhoods in cities and
urbanizing suburban nodes [will] become more desirable locations," while
"fringe suburban subdivisions [will] lose some appeal."

The giant baby boom generation is now moving into retirement -- a period in
life when driving typically decreases. Gasoline prices aren't going down any
time soon. And more Americans continue to look for opportunities to walk or
bike where they need to go -- both to save money and to enjoy better health.

Temporary factors, such as the recession and spikes in gasoline prices, have
certainly played a role in the reduction in driving. But an accumulation of
evidence suggests that -- at minimum -- the days of rapid, steady growth in
vehicle travel are over.

Why then is Washington arguing about how much to spend building our
grandfather's transportation network? The main question shouldn't be whether
we spend too much or too little on those programs. Instead, we should ask
why we continue to spend vast sums on building new highway capacity --
especially when there are far more productive ways to invest that money.

Fixing our existing roads, bridges and transit infrastructure is a good
place to start. Yet, federal and state policies often serve to incentivize
the construction of new highway capacity over the less-glamorous task of
taking care of what we have.

At the same time, Americans are hungering for more and better transportation
choices. Cities and states have proposals for new transit lines, passenger
rail service, bike lanes and sidewalks that are stuck on the drawing board
for lack of funds. *And if the objective is job creation, there is really no
contest: a recent report by Smart Growth America found that public
transportation projects funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment
Act created 70 percent more jobs per dollar than highway projects funded
under the law.*

America's transportation needs and desires are changing. If the president
and Congress want to get the most out of our transportation investments,
they must discard outmoded assumptions and make decisions based on the real
needs of Americans in the 21st century.