WASHINGTON — It's not just you. Traffic in the D.C. metro area is just as bad as it was before the pandemic. A new five-year-old study by the analytics firm StreetLight Data broke down the number of vehicle miles traveled (VMT) and congestion in metropolitan areas nationwide.
"Until the pandemic, vehicle miles traveled across the U.S. was on a largely unbroken trajectory upwards," the study authors write. "And this trend, while often associated with economic output, also meant higher emissions, and thus a worsening impact on climate and public health."
The pandemic, stay-at-home-orders and the rise of remote work meant a dramatic change to that upward trend.
"As the pandemic receded and the economy bounced back, changes in work culture raised a new and exciting question: Could the U.S. keep VMT down, or at least below the levels reached by 2019, and keep congestion from coming back, ushering in a new era?"
The answer, based on StreetLight's report, appears to be no. The study shows VMT is accelerating across the country.
Specifically in the District and surrounding areas of the DMV, the number of miles traveled by car through the spring of 2024 has seen a 0% change compared to 2019, before the pandemic. Meanwhile, congestion has gotten 1.1% worse. StreetLight says even small increases can have a big impact.
"While increases in congestion are relatively small on a percentage basis, they translate to real hours lost, especially in places where congestion is already high," the report says.
There is some good news though. While most metro areas studied saw vehicle miles traveled by car rise over the five year period, D.C. is the only large metro area that has not seen an increase in VMT.
StreetLight uses machine learning to analyze transportation data and shed light on how people, goods and services move in an effort to inform transportation decisions.
>> Read the full report here:
