Taking (or not taking) the bus

This is from a Census Bureau news release.

Despite rising fuel costs, commuters continued to drive their cars in 2005, according to a new U.S. Census Bureau analysis of data from the American Community Survey. The survey, gathered over the course of the year, found that driving to work was the favored means of commute of nearly nine out of 10 workers (87.7 percent), with most people (77 percent) driving alone.

In contrast, 4.7 percent of commuters used public transportation to travel to work in 2005, an increase of about 0.1 percent over 2000 levels.

About half of the nation’s public transportation commuters can be found in 10 of the nation’s 50 cities with the most workers age 16 or over: Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Seattle and Washington, D.C. These cities account for 2.9 million of the nation’s 6.2 million users of public transportation (see detailed tables).

To see the tables, click here. I'll warn you that it's an Excel chart with multiple worksheets. To see something simpler, click here.

There are times when I want to live closer to work, or live close to where I could take a bus to work. Most days, I don't need to have my vehicle close to work. But some days I do. It doesn't pay the TTA to run a bus anywhere near my house, so it doesn't. But my family and I are country people. Living far away from the bus line is a lifestyle choice we make.