U.S. Census Releases Report and Dataset on Commuting to Work by Car
From the U.S. Census:
The U.S. Census Bureau released a report [August 13, 2015], Who Drives to Work? Commuting by Automobile in the United States, 2013 [and embedded below), which looks at commuting by private vehicle.
The report highlights differences in rates of automobile commuting by population characteristics such as age, race, ethnicity, place of birth and the types of communities in which workers live, based on data collected during the 2013 American Community Survey.
Also released is a county-to-county commuting flows table package that looks at traveling to work between counties and the primary travel mode people use, based on American Community Survey data collected from 2006 to 2013.
Highlights from the Report
- About 86 percent of U.S. workers commuted to work by automobile in 2013; three out of four commuters drove alone.
- Driving alone to work peaked in 2010 at 76.6 percent but changed little between 2010 and 2013.
- Urban workers age 25 to 29 showed about a 4 percentage point decline in automobile commuting between 2006 and 2013.
- Workers age 25 to 29 showed the highest increase in public transportation commuting between 2006 and 2013, from 5.5 percent to 7.1 percent.
- The rate of carpooling has declined during each decade since 1980. About 9.0 percent of workers carpooled in 2013, down from 19.7 percent in 1980.
- At 78 percent, workers living in principal cities within metro areas had a lower rate of automobile commuting in 2013 than their suburban or nonmetropolitan counterparts (89 and 91 percent, respectively).
- Hispanic workers showed the highest rate of carpooling in 2013 and the largest declines in carpooling between 2006 and 2013, from 18.6 percent to 14.7 percent.
Who Drives to Work? Commuting by Automobile in the United States, 2013 by LJ’s infoDOCKET
Filed under: Data Files, News
About Gary Price
Gary Price (gprice@gmail.com) is a librarian, writer, consultant, and frequent conference speaker based in the Washington D.C. metro area. He earned his MLIS degree from Wayne State University in Detroit. Price has won several awards including the SLA Innovations in Technology Award and Alumnus of the Year from the Wayne St. University Library and Information Science Program. From 2006-2009 he was Director of Online Information Services at Ask.com.