In many cities, more and more commuters are getting to work without a car or mass transit, a Brookings map of newly published Census data shows. The size of the bubbles indicates the share of people who commute by bike or walking, or work from home. The color of the bubbles indicates how that number changed between 2007 and 2013 — red means fewer walk/bike/work from home workers, blue means more of them.
Map: Where more and more people are biking and walking to work
Andrew Theodorakis/Getty Images
The Brookings Institution
The decline in car commuting is due to slew of factors, including fewer people getting drivers’ licenses, improvements in alternative transportation, higher gas prices, and the recession.
Another interesting factor, which is often missed in these discussions, is the availability of fast and reliable broadband connections, which has led to more people not commuting at all. This shift is unprecedented and accelerating. Today more people are working from home than ever before, mitigating the need to travel as much.
U.S. Public Interest Research Group
As the chart above shows, from the early 1970s through the mid-2000s the number of miles driven by the average American steadily grew. But in the last decade, that growth was arrested and the number started to decline:
85 percent of commuters still drive to work, but that could change as biking, walking, public transit, and telecommuting grow in popularity.
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