This is surely one of the signs of the apocalypse: Americans aren’t driving as much as they used to. Nate Silver (2009) Esquire.
This is not news. The general direction of vehicle miles traveled has been on the decline now for several years. Every month that the data is published there are new theories explaining how the trend represents the wobbling economy or is due to elevated petrol prices. Indeed, there has been correlation between these data sets until now, where in particular, petrol prices alone do not explain the full picture.
Here is the latest eye-popping chart that will cause nightmares for the auto-industry and its benefactors via Doug Short of Advisor Perspectives.
What might be considered news about this ongoing story is less about how the general torpor of the economy influences our driving patterns, but the increasing understanding of what is underpinning the data. Doug Short has finally acknowledged that there are significant behavioral and demographic trends influencing the numbers and cited this fact from the Frontier Group.
From 2001 to 2009, the average annual number of vehicle miles traveled by young people (16 to 34-year-olds) decreased from 10,300 miles to 7,900 miles per capita—a drop of 23 percent.
Brad Plumer of the Washington Post in Why Aren’t Younger People in America Driving Anymore attempts to explain the data as a combination of low employment, price barriers to driving, technological advances, and the fact that many simply choose live in transit supported places. On the last point urban scholar Alan Ehrenhalt author of the Great Inversion agrees. In his book Ehrenhalt documents this trend across America noting that young people are flocking to city centres since they consider ‘free time is a commodity at least as important as money” and that “convenience trumps aesthetics”.
Here’s how influential Canadian pollsters try to explain the emerging urban demographic in this rich, quotable article via the Globe and Mail- The Cities of the Future Belong to the Millennial Generation:
Because the millennials are fiercely independent, they’ll live alone and wait rather than start up a family the way their parents did when they were in their 20s. Living in smaller spaces is fine by them, especially if it’s designed in an interesting way and uses materials that go easy on the environment. And their unit, whether it be in Leslieville, Toronto or Hillhurst, Calgary, must be surrounded by a vibrant, life-giving urbanity.
The decline in driving is not unique to North America, here is an compilation of articles on the global trend.
So how do we compare in New Zealand? Here’s a chart of the total number of vehicle kilometers traveled published by the MOT last year. In a couple of days Stu will show you what this data looks likes with updated numbers for 2012.
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I am amazed no one has noted one HUGE legal/cultural change that has led to less driving by people today – harsh drink driving laws. People who like to go out now either use PT or taxis to get themselves to and from bars, clubs, pus and restauarants. And that constant use of PT changes habits generally.
Interesting point. Have drinking and driving laws changed in NZ since 2005? Are the punishments more severe?
The age of driving has been raised one year too, but it’s still lower than the drinking age.
There are also fewer young people passing the now stricter licence tests. Something I have blogged about before.
They are flocking to city centres but are they also moving to large cities as well in greater numbers, i.e. not just an internal city movement but greater national/international migration to large cities for jobs?
Also people seem to be less tolerant of the average state of alternatives to driving, meaning the quality of PT is better than 10 years ago, which is the case in most large cities now. Still think we need something like this in the media in NZ though:
https://witness.guardian.co.uk/assignment/5179177ce4b0053f4e6bb915
Quick spend everything we’ve got on more motorways, clearly we need more now than ever before, come to think of it how did the city work before without them?…. Joycian is a word that will be used to described policies that head in exactly the wrong direction. I guess he will be remembered then…?
Are you just searching for stats to validate your political bent? Please explain http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10879448 then?
Let me get this straight: You’re suggesting Kent is biased for using actual VMT/VKT data collected by USDOT, as opposed to a self-selected survey from an online news article? Sending that “please explain” right back at ya …
Also, just because someone *says* that they have a particular dream home in mind (I really like castles) does not mean they are particularly serious about buying one (I don’t want to move to Dunedin). In fact, evidence suggests that people in Auckland are increasingly preferring central city suburbs. How do we know this? Because land values in those areas are going up faster than the periphery. This tends to support the “convenience” hypothesis I would think.
Of course we’d all like to have the best of both worlds, e.g. a lifestyle block replete with donkeys and badgers just on the other side of Grafton Bridge thank you very much. But when it comes to making real-world trade-offs, location seems to rank higher than “type of housing” (which was the focus of the Herald survey you link to), and any of the furry critters that tend to come with a lifestyle block.
If they had asked those people what kind of car they would like to drive, do you think they would all have answered Toyota Corolla? Not likely, even if it is the top selling car in NZ. Just like most Aucklanders (even Millenials) would like a villa in Ponsonby/Grey Lynn/Epsom/Mt Eden – but that isnt where they buy because almost no Millenial can afford those properties.
I am sure, all else being equal, most (not all) people would like to live in a detached house on a section. However, all else (travelling times, lack of vitality in suburban areas, high house prices) are not equal. The point of the articles lnked to in the post is that young people are weighing up all the pros and cons and deciding that shorter commutes, vibrant neighbourhoods and affordable housing are worth the sacrifice of not having that.
Even then a detached house doesnt have to mean driving if other options are provided, exactly what the UP contemplates. I live in Bayswater in a small (100sqm) house on small section and I cycle/ferry to work everyday. I am not a Millenial, more Generation X, and just had a baby – but we made a housing choice that meant I dont have to commute by car ever.
So in my opinion, and conversations I have with the young, highly educated people in my office, I believe the article is correct. Many are choosing inner city living over suburbia and PT/cycling over the car. Cycling in particular is becoming the cool thing among young urban people.
Times they are a changing.
Transport is not the only issue. Space and location is obviously a big thing, hence the “unreliable” Herald poll. Where is the pressure to move business and work from small locations and spread it over to where people want to live. Clustered telecommuting also …..
Why would Auckland soread out its employment like that? You are juts thinking of small town and then extrapolating that out to a big city. That is not how big cities work and Auckland is now a big city.
I can tell you after the earthquake in Chch a lot of business had to spread out in order to find premises. Most were unhappy with that and missed the agglomeration benefits of the CBD.
If you start spreading employment out, you start to lose the benefits of agglomeration of having your intelelctual capital all in one area which is the main advantage of a city and why thye are growing so fast. There are multiple posts about this on the blog as well as hundreds of articles and papers on the web – so I am not gong to spell it all out again. Enough to say that is not the way to make a city run efficiently and effectively.
Telecommuting – I know some people like telecommutting and probably you are one of them. Most people people I know dont like it and I dont believe it is a good thing. I would hate to work from home.
In businesses that depend on innovation and collaboration it lowers the cross fertilisation of ideas. Look at the recent ban on telecommuting by the new Yahoo! CEO. I really agree wither her POV from my experiences of IT businesses with a lot of telecommuters.
I dont believe that telecommuting is going to change things that much. It would have had a much greater effect already if that was the case.
Eactly, where is the pressure? Businesses can locate in any number of business parks, town centres and local areas all over Auckland, yet they chose to agglomerate in the CBD and few metropolitan centres. So they question is why we would want to force them to relocate when they don’t chose to do so of their own accord?
There’s plenty left unexplained there: Albany and Onehunga- how much of the wanting to move on is due to their housing type and how much due to the general “gotta have more” culture? How well informed are the people about the energy and maintenance costs of stand alone dwellings? etc…. (Peter M I think pointed out that body corps seem expensive, but often they’re cheap compared to what home owners spend).
Also, like the article says, we need more quality examples. And we need more larger dwellings in intensified developments so families can live there.
Which part needs explaining? These two setances sum it up: “Most of the 84 participating households said their way of living was just temporary and for affordability reasons.” and “Generally, residents were satisfied with their living arrangements – most said the housing offered a sense of security and they were pleased with the proximity to shops, schools, work and other facilities.”
How much explaining do you need that many people want to live in affordable housing near employment and services, and are willing to make trade-offs on their aspirations to do so?
Really this reporting doesn’t reveal much. Ok so kiwis still aspire to a large house on a quarter acre. So what? Does this tell us anything we didn’t know already? Kiwis still aspire to having 50 in flat screen TVs and hot tubs? Shall we make those mandatory in all homes? Kiwis still crave Mercedes and BMWs, so shall we stop importing second hand Toyotas in that case?
What people aspire to and what they want now are very different things, let alone what the need and what they can afford.
@ Peter. It’s the Herald mate, what would you expect, an article praising the virtues of the UP?
Really, ‘it’s just the Herald’. Not much of a rebuttal.
Frank E, point me to a well researched article, written by someone without an agenda, seriously discussing the UP, and published in the Herald.
Or a unicorn – you know – whichever is easier to find.
Comment of the week
“Always be yourself. Unless you can be a unicorn. Then always be a unicorn.” Or … the meme of the last 5 years: “keep calm, and be a unicorn”
http://www.facebook.com/ITS.SO.FLUFFEH
Good post, Kent. An overall decline in VMT/VKT per capita is certainly some hope. But could you help me understand the “chained to 1971”? I’m assuming this isn’t a per capita assessment and that it’s overall driving (I hope)?
One thing I consider with all of this: the hope of some kind of congestion/tolling charge emerging (perhaps we’ll see more of this in the Consensus Building Group’s report Monday). With the aspiration of continuing VKT decline, we shouldn’t be slow to warm up to pricing but we should surely incorporate this declining VKT trend into tolling policy. Wouldn’t want to dramatically hamstring funding for the things we want (fix it first, transport, cycling, walking)– unless we’re careful to link the declining funding more specifically to roads. It seems like there must be some equitable/logical way to do that given the impact/demand will decrease with decreasing VKT. But, I suppose, then there are the politics of it all….
As an aside, and speaking of politics, I love Nate Silver. When I worked for the Obama campaign in 2008, my colleagues and I kept hitting refresh on his blog bazillions of times and with increasing frequency leading up to election day. He pretty much pegged it and, thus, is now legendary. He did okay predicting 2012, too.
Finally, thanks for sneaking a Seattle photo in there. There are far better visual examples of Seattle cafe culture and urban liveability, but as a fresh transplant from that city, it’s nice to see my hometown represent.
Seattle is wonderful. Except for the weather.
Yes John I agree road pricing is a part of the answer. But mainly we’re just building the wrong stuff:
“A congested road without dedicated bus lanes and bikeways is a sign of technical incompetence and a lack of democracy”
The great Enrique Penalosa.
You nailed it, Patrick.
The fact that Auckland hasn’t seen more dedicated bus lanes and bikeways for awhile (since 2008? 9?) seems overwhelmingly odd.
Certainly I fail to see how no bus lanes can be based on any logic on streets like Customs Street where I frequently see a fully-loaded Link bus and 30 people at a stop being held up by 10-20 people in cars, often just a single car that in their desperation to enter the queues of congestion end up blocking lanes when exiting from side roads e.g. Fort Lane.
Yes this type of thing is frustrating. Has there already been a ‘easy fix’ bus lane post? If not, maybe it’s time for one.
I’d be interested to see what is happening with air kilometres travelled. I suspect cheaper airfares are having an effect on the need to drive your station wagon across the country.
Just read the 16 page research report. The Herald article cherrypicked a couple of lines that support their anti-UP agenda and thus presented a totally unbalanced view. Read it for yourself here:
http://www.creative.auckland.ac.nz/webdav/site/nicai/shared/schools-programmes-centres/transforming%20cities/FutureIntensiveExecSummary.pdf
For example, the following for the exec summary:
Overall, the case study developments indicated a reasonable level of satisfaction with the
experiences of living at medium densities, and meeting a range of household needs that
included bringing up children and caring for the elderly. In part, this positively supports
proposals to increase the supply of higher density housing promoted by the Auckland Plan.
However, we also recognise from our research that complex interactions between urban
planners, developers and potential buyers (owner-occupiers and investors) profoundly
influenced the physical characteristics of medium density developments. these interactions
produced a specific built form that may, or may not, exhibit good design elements and may,
or may not, promote long term ‘successful communities’…
Despite the positive responses to living at higher densities, for whatever reason, the
aspiration of living in detached suburban housing remains strong for both New Zealand
born and ‘new’ New Zealanders. However, this aspiration needs to be understood in relation
to the reasons given for living in their present accommodation: such as ‘proximity/location’
and ‘affordability.’ In this respect, the suburban ‘dream’ might simply be unrealistic and
unaffordable. thus, keeping in mind the low national median income of New Zealanders and
Auckland’s high house prices, it can be surmised there is a disjuncture between the desire
and aspiration to live in a standalone home and affordability considerations. Nevertheless,
the aspiration for suburbia (no matter how unrealistic) is a barrier to the promotion of
visions for a compact city that needs to be better understood.
Friggin Herald; they deserve a brick-bat. Why the anti-UP agenda? Is it because their main audience is old NIMBYs?
This is interesting. The driving slow-down is impacting the gas station business model, this explains why they are changing more and more to selling anything but gas: US figures;
From here: http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_gas_stations_are_there_in_the_US
Wonder what the stats are here. Always fantastic for the city when a gas stations goes. A new retail and apartment building is going up on Ponsonby Rd right now on the site of an old Mobil station. Much better land use and the end of dangerous car movements across the pavement on this busy human place. Onward. The more we can de-car the city the better on every level. I would love to see drive-in retail and fast food banned in urban areas.
There are a few fast food places that have parking and drive through contained in a basement, perhaps that is a suitable model for dense urban environments?
Not sure about the convenience store part but Stats NZ figures show that in the year 2000 there were 1248 businesses in the country who describe themselves as fuel retailers and they employed 12410 people. In 2012 there were 669 businesses employing 8500 people. Of course many of these businesses will operate multiple sites so not sure what the actual number of petrol stations is.
Well Shell exited the NZ market in part because the business of selling fuel is pretty profitless, and certainly when you look around Auckland Central and fringe areas there are large numbers of former petrol stations that have become shops. Most have been sucked up and replaced with far fewer large stations, such as that on Fanshawe Street.
Related- I found the following stat this week. Only 17.6% of the students at AT and AUT drive cars to school.