Car Culture

Fun With Data: How Workers Commute

Bike Pittsburgh has posted some great, sortable data about how commuters get to work in major American cities, drawn from a Census Bureau report. As you'd expect, New York comes in as the city where the least amount of people commute solo by car -- only 23.3 percent, followed by 37.2 percent in Washington, D.C. and 38.4 percent in San Francisco. Wichita, Kansas ranks as the place with the highest percentage of drivers: 85.1 percent of commuters use a car to get to work. The unfortunate national median for commuting by car is 74.15 percent.

By Mathew Katz

2:00 PM EDT on October 9, 2009

Image: Census Bureau via Economix

Bike Pittsburgh has posted some great, sortable data about how commuters get to work in major American cities, drawn from a Census Bureau report. As you’d expect, New York comes in as the city where the least amount of people commute solo by car — only 23.3 percent, followed by 37.2 percent in Washington, D.C. and 38.4 percent in San Francisco. Wichita, Kansas ranks as the place with the highest percentage of drivers: 85.1 percent of commuters use a car to get to work. The unfortunate national median for commuting by car is 74.15 percent.

There’s also an interesting chart on bike commuting trends by gender, in response to a Scientific American article which posits that cycling needs to be made more attractive to women in order to boost overall urban cycling numbers. The argument seems to check out: according to Bike Pittsburgh’s data, even in cities with relatively high levels of bike commuters, men cycle to work significantly more than women.

Mathew Katz

Mathew Katz is a Canadian freelance reporter/producer living in New York City. His writing has appeared in The Toronto Star, The Village Voice, Torontoist, The Huffington Post, and NPR.org. He's also had radio pieces appear on National Public Radio and the BBC World Service. Mathew graduated from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism is 2009, and before that completed a B.A. at the University of Toronto. He's an avid baker, and rides a worn-down hybrid bike around the city.

Car Culture | Commuting