The Antiplanner

Wasting Your Time

7th June 2010

Wasting Your Time

posted in Transportation |

The Texas Transportation Institute’s 2009 congestion report estimated that motorists wasted more than 4 billion hours in traffic in 2007, or about 36 hours per commuter. One way that is often proposed to reduced this waste is getting people to ride transit.

But the cure may be worse than the disease, suggests Steven Polzin of the Center for Urban Transportation Research at the University of South Florida. Polzin points out that the 2009 National Household Transportation Survey found that the average speed of commuters who take cars is 33 mph, while the average speed of commuters who ride transit is only 12 mph.

Rapid transit? Not hardly. Most light-rail lines average 20 mph, and this Hudson-Bergen train is even slower than that.
Flickr photo by WallyG.

Polzin estimates this represents 3 billion hours of wasted time. Although that’s less than three-quarters of the amount of time wasted by congestion, far fewer people commute by transit than by car — 7 million vs. 124 million in 2008. So 3 billion hours is well over 400 hours per transit commuter.

“While one often hears about the ‘cost of congestion,’ there is virtually no one talking about the ‘cost of using slower modes of travel,’” says Polzin. “We hear a lot about the value of having a choice of modes but increasingly little about the value of having a choice of an uncongested or less congested travel option.” In effect, Polzin suggests, transit causes billions of dollars “of lost productivity.”

Of course, some transit advocates will argue that people can work on a train or bus, but not while driving a car. Realistically, however, how often do you see people working while riding transit? Most read a newspaper, listen to their iPods, or stare off into space. On the other hand, if you really want to work, you can listen to educational audio-books while you drive.

To be fair, many people who use transit may not be wasting their time. More than a third of transit commuters work in the New York urbanized area, most of them in Manhattan, which is so congested that transit is probably faster than driving.

Still, Polzin points out — and as the Antiplanner has previously observed — increased mobility and speeds have greatly contributed to the nation’s wealth and productivity. “There are lots of good reasons to enable and encourage use of alternative modes but analysis of the consequences should strive to be objective about the travel time and productivity consequences.” For many commuters who now drive, asking them to take transit instead is asking them to substitute 400 wasted hours for 36 wasted hours.

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There are currently 16 responses to “Wasting Your Time”

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  1. 1 On June 7th, 2010, the highwayman said:

    Though Mr.O’Toole your “job” as a highway lobbyist is to waste other peoples time & money by writing anti-transit crap.

    By comparison people on welfare are more productive members of society than you Mr.O’Toole!

    posted on June 7th, 2010 at 2:56 am

  2. 2 On June 7th, 2010, OFP2003 said:

    I ride Mass Transit (light rail). It’s about 15 minutes slower each way. And it is more expensive unless I factor in wear and tear on the car. AND (really big AND) THERE IS NO HIGHWAY TO DRIVE ON! Due to the wonders of urban planning in the 60′s & 70′s the Interstate Route from my house to my work was killed and never constructed. So if I do drive it’s on state highways, and city streets. A 26-mile drive in 35 minutes on Sunday morning or 60 minutes during rush hour.

    But the reason I take it is to recoup the time, I can sit and read or sleep (sitting up) instead of sitting in the driver’s seat with my foot on the clutch.

    I guess if fares and ridership were increased enough for the system to break-even I would very quickly switch back to driving as it would be become more comfortable and clearly more cost efficient.

    posted on June 7th, 2010 at 5:18 am

  3. 3 On June 7th, 2010, Dan said:

    Polzin’s analysis didn’t count everything. One would think with all the cries for objective analysis around here, the author of this blog would choose analyses that used objective analysis and counted more things.

    Please, everyone: no harrumphing ululations of outrage toward Randal and his use of biased analyses to prop up your ideology…er…his “argument”.

    DS

    posted on June 7th, 2010 at 7:32 am

  4. 4 On June 7th, 2010, bennett said:

    OFP brings up 2 interesting points.

    1. That the time he spends on transit is not “wasted,” as Polzin would have us believe. I suppose with the right amount of bluetooth technology you may not be wasting time behind the wheel, but safety becomes a concern.

    2. The concern that an INTERstate highway is not available to take him to work. Part of the reason that traffic is so heinous in Austin is that you basically HAVE to take the interstate to get anywhere. The interstate is not used for interstate travel. We have lots of great big highways with great big frontage roads in Austin, but have the worst traffic per capita in the country. Obviously it’s not due to lack of highway capacity, but instead lack of effective transportation planning and implementation. Austin doesn’t have an integrated transportation network, with connecting streets and viable mode choices. Things are changing, particularly on the bicycle front, but until we have streets that connect to our several highways, we’ll be wasting a lot of time down here, no matter how we choose to get to work.

    posted on June 7th, 2010 at 8:27 am

  5. 5 On June 7th, 2010, lgrattan said:

    HIGHWAYMAN REMEMBER YOU ARE ON A STAGE AND ABOUT 350 PEOPLE FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD ARE READING YOUR POSTS. PLEASE GIVE US SOME FACTS. lIST A BOOK YOU HAVE WRITTEN OR AN OP-ED OR SOMETHING OF FACTS AND INTEREST.

    posted on June 7th, 2010 at 12:16 pm

  6. 6 On June 7th, 2010, OFP2003 said:

    My side of town is the “rough” part of town. And, continued economic growth needs a transportation network. Refusing to connect us in with an Interstate-quality-super-highway connection to the city center is going to continue to stymie growth.

    posted on June 7th, 2010 at 12:25 pm

  7. 7 On June 7th, 2010, the highwayman said:

    lgrattan said:
    HIGHWAYMAN REMEMBER YOU ARE ON A STAGE AND ABOUT 350 PEOPLE FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD ARE READING YOUR POSTS. PLEASE GIVE US SOME FACTS. lIST A BOOK YOU HAVE WRITTEN OR AN OP-ED OR SOMETHING OF FACTS AND INTEREST.

    THWM: Dude, just because you’re a Scientologist, doesn’t mean that other people want to be Scientologists too!

    posted on June 7th, 2010 at 1:46 pm

  8. 8 On June 7th, 2010, gene_weeks said:

    Lowell, I just ignore/dont read anything he says. If everyone did that he will eventually go away.

    posted on June 7th, 2010 at 5:42 pm

  9. 9 On June 7th, 2010, ws said:

    I think time is a good criticism of transit. Transit should be competing against highways and cars, and pumping money into super-slow systems (or ones with long headways) is a reasonable argument.

    posted on June 7th, 2010 at 8:34 pm

  10. 10 On June 7th, 2010, ws said:

    How cute:

    http://www.newgeography.com/content/001606-urban-economies-the-cost-wasted-time

    You guys tag-teamed the same subject. Did you call each other the night before to discuss your new articles? ;-)

    posted on June 7th, 2010 at 9:18 pm

  11. 11 On June 8th, 2010, the highwayman said:

    ws said:
    How cute:

    http://www.newgeography.com/content/001606-urban-economies-the-cost-wasted-time

    You guys tag-teamed the same subject. Did you call each other the night before to discuss your new articles?

    THWM: Cox & O’Toole must be teabagging each other! lol

    posted on June 8th, 2010 at 2:56 am

  12. 12 On June 8th, 2010, the highwayman said:

    gene_weeks said: Lowell, I just ignore/dont read anything he says. If everyone did that he will eventually go away.

    THWM: Well thank you for admitting that you’re ignorant!

    posted on June 8th, 2010 at 3:06 am

  13. 13 On June 9th, 2010, Dan said:

    Looky what happens when you count other things:

    Abstract

    In the face of a society that exhibits an increasing dependence on motorised mobility, the response of transport policy is one that remains grounded in the pursuit of quicker journey times. Less time spent travelling is assumed to convert ‘unproductive’ time into economically valuable time. This paper explores an alternative perspective on travel time. It seeks to examine the notion that travel time, rather than being wasted, can and does possess a positive utility. This brings into question the extent of assumed economic benefits derived from schemes and policies intended to reduce journey times. Specifically the paper reports on a national mail-back questionnaire survey of 26,221 rail passengers in Great Britain conducted in autumn 2004. The survey examined how passengers used their time on the train, how worthwhile that time use was considered to be and the role of mobile technologies. The results paint a picture of travel time use in which the behaviour and opinions of commuters, business travellers and leisure travellers are compared and contrasted. A substantial if not overwhelming incidence of positive utility of travel time use is revealed, especially for business travel but also for commuting and leisure travel. In light of the survey evidence the paper points to the challenge of understanding the notion of productivity and offers some critical comments concerning the current approach to economic appraisal in Britain. [emphases added]

    Lyons, Jain and Holley 2007. The use of travel time by rail passengers in Great Britain. Trans. Res. A 41:1 pp. 107-120 doi:10.1016/j.tra.2006.05.012

    One wonders why the O’Tooles and Coxes of the world “forget” to tell their readers about such things.

    DS

    posted on June 9th, 2010 at 11:43 am

  14. 14 On June 9th, 2010, dmccall said:

    If the typical American worker commutes on 240 days a year, that is only 9 minutes per day, or 4.5minutes “wasted” per commute. The survey doesn’t seem to include time people waited on transit platforms waiting for the next high-density vehicle (you cannot spread out and get work done when you have only 15s of lead time before the next vehicle arrives, nor do stations have adequate benches for such “work”).

    The survey also fails to include time SAVED by driving. I am certain that the privacy of my sheltered car and the ability to choose when I travel and which route I take saves me more than 9 minutes per day. The study also does not address that Americans spend more than 360 minutes a day “watching TV”.

    posted on June 9th, 2010 at 2:33 pm

  15. 15 On June 15th, 2010, prk166 said:

    @dmccall, I have similar questions about the studies. From my experience I can get a little work done but it not only counts on a relatively empty train but also isn’t very productive. And of course to take the train I spend a lot of time getting to and from it and waiting for the train. Even with traffic I could drive the same route in the amount of time I spend on the train. And what little work I could do on the train, I could just as easily do with 10-15 minutes of work at home.

    posted on June 15th, 2010 at 5:44 am

  16. 16 On June 15th, 2010, Dan said:

    The many studies done in Yurp belie the ideologically- and societally-colored anecdotes after my pointing out productivity gains.

    Yes, people on transit are actually able to do something productive and increase their utility, as opposed to sitting gape-jawed in a car doing nothing. Survey after survey in Yurp where they have actually figured it out shows this basic, simple fact of life.

    Strange to think of for the auto-addicted and for other denizens in an auto-dependent society, but true.

    DS

    posted on June 15th, 2010 at 7:15 am

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