Below is an infographic from the New Jersey Institute of Technology about road congestion and how our profession is working on it. I like infographics in general and this one has some interesting data.
I do wonder about the forecasts though. Some of the references are two to three years old. As I wrote about half a year ago, Washington State has altered their long term forecasts to continue the decreasing trend in vehicle miles traveled.
The increase in vehicle miles traveled has definitely slowed and my hunch is car sharing along with autonomous vehicles are going to radically change congestion levels in the future (or maybe how much we care about congestion). We can’t stop working on congestion as an industry, but our planning efforts should consider the potential shift in driving patterns.
NJIT Online Masters in Civil Engineering
