Walking to Work: Trends in the United States, 2005-2014

I examined trends from 2005 through 2014 in walking to work compared with other modes of travel. For each year, I calculated the percentage of travel to work by private vehicle, public transportation, and walking and used distance decay functions to analyze the distribution of walking by distance. I found that the percentage of travel to work by walking remained stable, with a slight increase over time, and that people tended to walk longer to get to work. The trend is positive and encouraging, although more evidence is needed to confirm my findings.