Peak VMT: do we really need new roads & bridges?
August 23rd, 2010 by Jim JustThe Federal Highway Administration’s Traffic Volume Trends, June 2010 reports that vehicle miles driven in 2010 were up 1.3% over June 2010. Cumulative VMT for 2010 is now up 0.1% year to date over 2009:
Travel on all roads and streets changed by +1.3% (3.4 billion vehicle miles) for June 2010 as compared with June 2009. Travel for the month is estimated to be 263.9 billion vehicle miles.
Cumulative Travel for 2010 changed by +0.1% (1.6 billion vehicle miles). The Cumulative estimate for the year is 1,469.8 billion vehicle miles of travel.
In Oregon, vehicle miles traveled (VMT) in June declined 0.4% over 2009.
VMT in the U.S. now appear to be moving sideways. Miles driven are still 1.8% below the peak, and only 0.1% above the 2009 trough.
If the trend of ever-increasing VMT is now broken or even reversing, that would call into question the wisdom and the need of spending billions of dollars on capacity-enhancing infrastructure projects. Take the Columbia River Crossing: if vehicle traffic is falling rather than increasing, why would we need it?
UPDATE 8/24: Todd Litman has posted on his blog this chart showing how U.S. VMT is now down about 10% from the long-term trend:
Litman points out the emerging reality means we need to rethink our approach to transportation:
This requires a major change in the way we think about transportation problems and evaluate solutions. Most state and regional transportation plans are based on the assumption that VMT will continue to grow as it did in the past, so the primary problem is traffic congestion. The decline in VMT growth indicates that traffic congestion problems will be less severe and other problems will become more important, including inadequate mobility options for non-drivers, transit crowding, transport affordability, and environmental concerns.
Litman concludes with what should be obvious to all: the need to expand roads and parking facilities will decline.