Recent Streetsblog NYC posts about Transportation Policy

A Golden Opportunity for Congress to Avoid the Transportation “Fiscal Cliff”

By Tanya Snyder | May 1, 2013 | No Comments

MAP-21 expires in a year and five months. When it does, if lawmakers haven’t already found a solution to the “transportation fiscal cliff,” they’ll have to do one of three things, according to a report issued last week by the Congressional Budget Office [PDF]: Transfer $14 billion more in general funds Raise the gas tax […]

A Better Way to Grade City Transportation Systems

By Angie Schmitt | Apr 15, 2013 | No Comments

How should we grade America’s transportation systems? The big, headline-grabbing transportation metric right now is the Texas Transportation Institute’s Urban Mobility Report, which holds up the lack of congestion as the ultimate sign of a well-functioning transportation system. By that measure, cities like Kansas City, Phoenix, and Detroit — where car commutes can be free-flowing […]

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Streetfacts: Americans Are Driving Less

By Clarence Eckerson Jr. | Apr 2, 2013 | No Comments

We continue our Streetfacts series by looking at the data on driving in the U.S. Per-capita driving has declined every year since 2005. That’s not a blip, it’s now an 8-year trend. The reason? Neither the state of the economy nor changes in gas prices offer a satisfactory explanation. Social preferences and demographic shifts seem to […]

For Eighth Year in a Row, the Average American Drove Fewer Miles in 2012

By Angie Schmitt | Feb 27, 2013 | No Comments

For decades — through the rise of the two-car household, women entering the workforce, the growth of the exurbs — Americans reliably put more miles on their cars every year. But no longer. Last year, for the eighth year in a row, vehicle miles traveled ticked down on a per-capita basis. The average American drove […]

The Next Generation DOT

By Charles Marohn | Jan 4, 2013 | No Comments

Cross-posted from the Strong Towns blog. Charles Marohn is a planner and engineer in Minnesota and the executive director of Strong Towns. We’ve been looking at the instincts of today’s transportation agencies. While on an individual level it is clear that these organizations are filled with people who are professional, competent and want to do the […]

It’s Not the Economy, Stupid: Americans Really Are Driving Less

By Stephen Miller | Nov 5, 2012 | No Comments

Since 2005, Americans have been driving fewer miles each year. While the shift predated the onset of the Great Recession, the question of whether the decline in driving marked a sea change in the way we get around or simply reflected a drop in economic activity has been a matter of considerable debate. Enter economist Joe Cortright, who […]

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