LOS ANGELES – With California’s economy slowly recovering, the traffic congestion is getting worse in Los Angeles and Orange County, according to new reports.
Studies from several years ago showed the opposite trend–other major cities like Chicago and Washington D.C. had eclipsed Southern California as the nation’s new leader in traffic records and slow commutes.
Now, as the economy continues to improve little by little, LA and the OC are making slow comebacks to their old congested reputation.
According to census data and the Texas Transportation Institute at Texas A&M University, average annual delays for motorists and the length of daily in- and outbound commutes are on the rise again. Only Washington DC surpasses the LA-Orange County area in terms of congestion and traffic-related delays.
The institute’s mobility study also shows that motorists in both counties experience on average 61 hours of delay annually – a four-hour increase over 2008, the early part of the economic downturn. That’s far above the national average of 38 hours.
On the other hand, Washington DC-area motorists average 67 hours of delay a year, while Chicago has tumbled to seventh place in the ranks, at 51 hours.
A Los Angeles Times analysis of the US Census Bureau’s American Community Survey showed a similar economic trend, but also suggests that traffic commutes have increased significantly more in LA County than anywhere else.
From 2009 to 2013, the average time it took for commuters to get to work in LA County nearly doubled to 27.73 minutes on average. In Orange County, the commute increased less than half of that to 23.80 minutes.
The steepest rise in the larger SoCal area occurred in Riverside County, where commute times jumped more than four minutes, to 27.76 minutes.
Over the longer term, census data from 1990 to 2010 showed that commute times for all modes of travel have trended upward about 10 percent in LA County, but dipped slightly in the OC.
Various factors have contributed to travel delays, such as the lingering recession as well as lifestyle and career changes.
“The best solution to congestion is, unfortunately, unemployment,” said Alan E. Pisasrski, a transportation policy consultant and author of the “Commuting in America” book series.
During the recession, unemployment ranged from 8 to 13 percent in Los Angeles and other surrounding countries. Today, it runs from 5.8 percent in Orange County to slightly more than 8 percent in LA, Riverside, and San Bernardino counties. A number of workers have also stopped looking for jobs.
Pisarski also said that during the economic downturn, consumer spending on transportation dropped significantly and has recovered slowly ever since. Truck travel has also gone down, he said.
“The growth in delay and commute times is really quite modest,” said Martin Wachs, a transportation expert in UCLA’s urban planning department. “Given the lack of investment in highways and the economic recovery, I would have expected more of an increase.”
But there’s still good news. In the long run, annual congestion-related delay for the Greater Los Angeles region is still below the peak of 79 hours per motorist reached in 2006, when gas prices were low and the economy was booming. The rise in average commute times is only a few minutes more than over a decade ago.
“It’s likely people are adjusting their work and travel habits to avoid commuting during rush hour,” Wachs added. “They work at home, change their hours, move closer to their jobs and otherwise try to travel during off-peak periods.”
Brian Taylor, an urban planning professor at UCLA, cautioned that rising commutes may also involve factors beyond street and highway congestion.
For instance, longer travel distances and greater use of bicycles and public transit can increase travel times. Such a shift might be underway in the LA area, where the portion of those driving to work has gone down by as many as three percentage points since 1990.
It’s not yet clear whether congestion-related delays and commute times will keep increasing, but with the way current economic trends are going, experts would not be entirely surprised.
“It’s hard to tell if this is a permanent trend,” Pisarski said. “Congestion is immensely variable around the country.”
(With reports from Los Angeles Times)
(www.asianjournal.com)
(LA Midweek October 29-31, 2014 Sec. A pg.1)
