Economic factors tap the brakes on traffic congestion
Source: Texas Transportation Institute

As goes the American economy, so goes the traffic.

Though it might have been hard to notice, traffic congestion took a break from its worsening trend even before the current recession, with high gas prices in the last half of 2007 bringing about a slight reduction in traffic. The recession that took hold soon after could prolong that effect, but experts warn that the slowdown in congestion growth will be temporary. When the economy rebounds, expect traffic problems to do the same.

The most current information on the nation’s traffic picture is outlined in the 2009 Urban Mobility Report, published recently by the Texas Transportation Institute. This year’s installment tracks a quarter century of traffic patterns in 439 U.S. urban areas from 1982 through 2007. The report was prepared by researchers David Schrank and Tim Lomax.

Travelers spent one hour less stuck in traffic in 2007 than they did the year before and wasted one gallon less gasoline than the year before. The differences are small, but they represent a rare break in near-constant growth in traffic over 25 years.

“This is a very small change,” says Schrank. “No one should expect to be driving the speed limit on their way to work because of this.” That’s because the average traveler still needs 25 percent more time for those trips.

+ 2009 Annual Urban Mobility Report

This entry was posted on Friday, July 10th, 2009 at 8:14 am and is filed under Documents in the news, Infrastructure, Motor vehicles, Transportation and travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.