I’ve been following this trend for a while now.
We are seeing a decline in driving in America that is unprecedented since the advent of the automobile.
In the graph below, from Calculated Risk, you can see that we’re now see the total vehicle miles driven essentially stagnant, despite an increasing population and despite a clear trend line going back several decades.
According to the U.S. Department of Transportation Federal Highway Administration, the current moving 12-month average of over 2.9 trillion miles is lower than 2005. The American population has grown by more than 10 percent since then.
From the Wonkblog’s Why aren’t younger Americans driving anymore?:
Ever since the recession hit in late 2007, Americans have been driving less and less. Was that because of the horrible economy? To some extent, perhaps. But it’s striking that Americans are still cutting back on driving even though the economy is growing again.
Doug Short, who charts financial data, has put together a nice graph that uses the latest Transportation Department data on vehicle-miles driven and adjusts for population growth.
Short’s data show that the population-adjusted driving decline actually began in 2005, two years before the recession.
The Wonkblog post by Brad Plumer focuses on young people’s driving habits:
But another huge part of the story is that young Americans are driving much, much less. Between 2001 and 2009, the average yearly number of miles driven by 16- to 34-year-olds dropped a staggering 23 percent.
The Frontier Group has the most comprehensive look yet of why younger Americans are opting out of driving. Public transportation use is up 40 percent per capita in this age group since 2001. Bicycling is up 24 percent overall in that time period. And this is true even for young Americans who are financially well off.
Bill McBride at Calculated Risk also notes that the general aging of the population comes into play here too. Older Americans drive less.
Here’s the graph of total miles, with no adjustment for population growth. If we continue to see stagnation in the total number of miles traveled on roads and highways, we will see some profound implications for transportation spending.
