Houston’s rush hour commute shorter in 2010

Because of recession

David Crossley, Sep 27, 11.

If you have the impression that Houston traffic congestion has eased a bit with the economic recession, you’re right, according to a story in the Houston Chronicle:

An annual study by the Texas Transportation Institute at Texas A&M University shows that the length of Houston’s daily “rush hour” in 2010 was 5.75 hours, compared with 6 hours in 2009 and 2008. It was 6.25 hours in 2007, the first year the measure was included in the study.

Congestion time, or rush hour, was defined in the study as the period when freeway traffic is moving at speeds under 30 mph and movement on arterial streets slows to less than 20 mph.

Houston’s congestion period may be shorter, but local drivers are still wasting a lot of time stuck in traffic, according to the 2011 Urban Mobility Report, which is based upon 2010 data.

The annual delay for each Houston commuter traveling at peak times was 57 hours in 2010, the equivalent of nearly 1 ½ weeks of vacation.

That figure hasn’t changed much since 2005, when it was 55 hours, but Houston has changed in rank from eighth worst in the nation to fourth worst in terms of the annual delay per commuter. Washington, DC, ranked worst in 2010, followed by Chicago and Los Angeles.

The change in rank says more about Houston’s economy than it does about the local traffic congestion, said Tim Lomax, a researcher who worked on the mobility report.

“Going from 8 to 4 is not inconsequential,” Lomax said. “It says something good about Houston’s economy. You haven’t gotten the (lower) congestion benefits from having a crummy economy. This is one of the few down sides to having a comparatively good economy.” MORE

Also see: Mass Transit Saved Drivers 45.4 Million Hours Last Year

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