Transportation Walking Among US Adults With and Without Transportation Insecurity, 2022 National Health Interview...

How Americans get to everyday destinations has implications for health and well-being. Transportation insecurity, or the lack of safe and convenient access to reliable transportation, is a public health problem that can lead to morbidity and mortality through injuries and chronic disease. Walking can be a healthy and low-cost mode of transportation. This study describes transportation walking among US adults with and without transportation insecurity.

We used 2022 National Health Interview Survey data on 25,889 US adults to estimate the prevalence of transportation walking among adults with and without transportation insecurity across sociodemographic and geographic subgroups. We tested subgroup differences using pairwise comparisons.

In this sample, 5.6% (95% CI, 5.1%-6.2%) of US adults reported transportation insecurity. Walking for transportation was twice as common among adults with transportation insecurity (30.9%; 95% CI, 27.9%-34.1%) than among adults without transportation insecurity (15.3%; 95% CI, 14.5%-16.1%). Among adults with transportation insecurity, the prevalence of transportation walking was higher for adults with the lowest versus the highest levels of educational attainment, adults below versus above their poverty threshold, non-Hispanic Black versus non-Hispanic White adults, younger versus older adults, adults without versus adults with disabilities, and those residing in the West versus the South.

About 1 in 6 US adults walk for transportation, but those with transportation insecurity are twice as likely to do so as those without. Infrastructure and policies that support walking can help improve the health and well-being of Americans and may be especially important for those experiencing transportation insecurity.