IF ONE COMMUTES, IT TAKES TIME! Get over it!

Every year the Texas Transportation Institute at Texas A&M University  puts out an annual Mobility Report  that details the traffic congestion in 439 urban areas. The speed data is supplied by INRIX,  the leading-provider of traffic information. Guess what? There is congestion during morning and evening rush hours in all urban areas. Is that some big revelation?

The report starts out by telling people what causes congestion:

“In a word, “you.” Most of the Mojave Desert is not congested. But the rural portions also support very few jobs, has hardly any schools and provides a very small contribution to the nation’s economic production. The 100 largest metropolitan regions, on the other hand, contribute 70 percent of the gross domestic product and have 69 percent of the jobs (17). It is not surprising that congestion exists in large areas given the number of people and the amount of freight moving in many directions over the course of two peak periods of two or three hours each.”

Did anybody reading this blog not know that already? Will it make anyone's commute more palatable to know that “The commuting uber reference, Commuting in America III confirmed the lengthening commute times, with average travel time to work growing 2 minutes (to 25.5 minutes) from 1990 to 2000, following a 1.7 minute increase in the decade before.”


So we have two studies hundreds of pages long that confirm that there is congestion during rush hour. A four year old could know that by looking out the window of their car as they travel to spend a day at Mommy or Daddy’s office one morning.

According to an AP story, ” Using real-time data to calculate commuter mileage, speed and distance traveled over time, the institute estimated traffic tie-ups cost about $115 billion in 2009. The study released Thursday cites factors such as wasted fuel, lost work hours and delays in shipping goods.”


Nationally, in 2009, commuters lost 34 hours in commuting time because of snarled traffic, but in Chicago, the number of hours was 70. After reading this information are people who live in Winnetka going to give up their beautiful home, backyard and highly-rated public school to move downtown so their commute is just a few minutes? No, of course not! They chose to live in a suburb for the amenities it offers to families and the commute is just part of the off-set.


I find it hysterical when these studies come out with headlines about the horrors of traffic congestion because they will not make one iota of difference in a person’s decision where to live.  Economics and family are the two important reasons behind where people choose to reside.

Everybody knows that there is congestion during rush hour. We don’t have to be told by detailed reports and surveys. Don’t like commuting? Do what the Mobility study tells us, move to the Mojave desert!