Bicycling for all trips hits 1 percent

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Blogging live from the Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting, one of the biggest events of the year for transportation nerds…er, professionals. I got an early look at the 2009 data from the National Household Transportation Survey. The NHTS is in some ways better than the American Community Survey because it asks respondents about all trips, so we can see bicycling’s share of all trips in the US.

Bicycling’s share of all trips in the US hit an even 1 percent in 2009. That’s up 25 percent since 2001. Bicycling’s journey to work and school numbers both top out at 0.7 percent.

More NHTS Numbers (change from 2001 to 2009)

* Bicycling and walking are up to 12 percent of all trips- an increase of 25 percent.

* Bicycling is an even 1.0 percent of all trips, up from 0.8 – a 25 percent increase.

* Walking is up to 10.9 percent of all trips from 9.6 – also a 25 percent increase.

* Transit + bike/walk is at 16 percent.

Darren Flusche
League Policy Analyst

Flusche joined the League in April 2009 and has a B.A. in history from Syracuse University and a Masters of Public Administration with a concentration in public policy analysis from New York University.

This entry was posted on Monday, January 11th, 2010 at 3:43 pm and is filed under Research/Policy, Statistics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

8 Responses to “Bicycling for all trips hits 1 percent”

1. Barry Childress Says:
   January 12th, 2010 at 10:31 pm

   I’m curious on our progress on reaching 15% of all trips by non-motorized transport per the goal of SAFETEA-LU.

2. Our government in action: Encouraging drivers to park in bike lanes « BikingInLA Says:
   January 13th, 2010 at 2:14 am

   [...] can turn your helmet into a speaker? You do wear a helmet, right? Is there sexism in cycling? U.S. bicycling trips are up 25% — to a whopping 1% of all trips. Facebook refuses to remove the anti-cycling hate group; that [...]

3. We’re with Lutz: Raise the gas tax | m-bike.org Says:
   January 14th, 2010 at 3:20 am

   [...] the standard article about bike commuting every time there’s a gas price spike, but watching bicycle’s 1% share of trips climb more rapidly would be [...]

4. Sal Seubert Says:
   January 20th, 2010 at 2:30 pm

   I think the bike league should take action against Facebook for this group – disgusting.

   http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/pages/Theres-a-perfectly-good-path-right-next-to-the-road-you-stupid-cyclist/190080667052?ref=mf

5. Matt O'Toole Says:
   January 20th, 2010 at 7:39 pm

   I think we have a pretty good argument that with 1% modeshare, biking deserves 1% of transportation spending, and road safety spending. How much do we get now? It would be great if our national advocacy orgs could provide answers to this question, to help us make this argument.

6. Darren Says:
   January 21st, 2010 at 10:15 am

   Matt,

   Biking and walking combined make up 12 percent of all trips but the two modes together received only 2 percent of all federal transportation spending in 2009, even with ARRA stimulus dollars included. Note: The coding of federal spending in the data records is a mess, such that you cannot isolate bike-only spending.

   http://americabikes.org/Documents/ABFederalSpendingPR.pdf

7. US cycling up 25% since 2001 « Bike Denton Says:
   January 22nd, 2010 at 12:12 am

   [...] League of American Bicyclists just leaked some new data from the National Household Transportation survey about bicycling’s share of [...]

8. Aggregator 1-3-2010 « Rolling and tumbling Says:
   January 30th, 2010 at 7:10 pm

   [...] Bicycling hits 1% of all trips, a 25% increase since 2001. [...]