The results from the second month tracking my daily travel are in.
In July, I spent 10 days in the Baltimore/DC metro area, 10 days in Austin, and 10 days in Houston — three metropolitan areas with very different transportation mixes. I was surprised to see that, in spite of spending 1/3 of the month in Houston (a city that is notoriously difficult to navigate in any form of transportation other than a car), I improved on my trip profile in alternative forms of transportation, dropping from 48% single occupancy car trips in June to 35% in July.
Trip Profile in July:
Car
|
Transit
|
Walk
|
Other
(air, car share, carpool, cycling)
| |
My Trips
|
35%
|
18%
|
36%
|
11%
|
83%
|
2%
|
10%
|
4%
|
Two longer trips during the month may have artificially increased the overall numbers: a train ride from Baltimore to DC and a roundtrip between Austin and Dallas using Zipcar.
For example:
- These two trips account for 60% of the carbon emissions I avoided over the course of the month. Using EPA estimates of average passenger car CO2 emissions, I more than doubled my avoidance of CO2 from 32,000 grams in June to 82,000 grams in July – roughly equivalent to taking 4 cars off the road for a day.
- On the other hand, these trips were also likely responsible for lowering the average daily health benefits from increasing the number of trips I took using alternative forms of transportation. In spite of the change, I still scraped by with an average of 141 calories burned per day in transportation-related activities (1 calorie above the Surgeon General’s recommendation). And, I averaged the minimum recommendation of physical activity: 30 minutes per day.
- As relatively fast modes of transportation, these two trips may also have helped reduce the difference between my overall monthly average trip time and the baseline (the trip time in a single-occupancy car) from an average of 32 minutes a day in June to 22 minutes a day in July.
But, as I experienced in July, there is no such thing as an average month.
I am learning that location plays a large role in determining trip profile. In August, I am splitting my time between Austin and Houston. We’ll see how that affects my ability to maintain a similar array of cost savings, offset carbon emissions, and health benefits associated with active transportation.
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