When they become congruent—recognizing that people love the suburbs and their cars—we will all be better off, and be able to move around our local communities much more efficiently, and take the high speed rail to LA and the City.
Americans like to be in driver's seat
Solo commuting is regional norm, too; alternatives stall this decade despite gas price surge.
By Clint Swett - Bee Staff Writer
Published 12:00 am PDT Thursday, June 14, 2007
Soaring gas prices and more-congested roadways during the first half of the decade did almost nothing to alter people's commuting habits in either Sacramento or the nation as a whole, according to statistics released Wednesday.
The U.S. Census Bureau reported that 75.6 percent of Sacramento-area workers drove solo to work in 2005, while 12.8 percent carpooled and 2.2 percent took public transportation.
Those figures were essentially unchanged from 2000. And they came as commuters paid dearly at the gas pump, shelling out an average of $2.43 a gallon for regular unleaded in 2005, up 39 percent from $1.75 a gallon five years earlier.
In addition, nearly 90,000 additional commuters clogged area roads in 2005 compared with 2000, the Census Bureau reported.
It will take more than high gas prices and jammed roads to shift people's commuting patterns, said Gordon Garry, director of research and analysis for the Sacramento Area Council of Governments.
"People's habits are pretty regular, and they change over a long period of time," he said.
He said government leaders are pushing for land-use decisions that require homes to be built near work or public transportation.
"These are aimed at (reducing) the commuting numbers and increasing the walking- and biking-to-work numbers," he said.
While Sacramentans seem disinclined to move to carpools or public transportation, drivers nationally are even more reluctant.
In 2005, 77 percent of Americans drove to work alone and 10.7 percent rode in carpools. About 4.7 percent of workers took public transportation, but those numbers were boosted by the high percentage of workers in urban areas such as New York, Chicago and San Francisco who have access to extensive rail and bus systems.
