US Driving Dropped Off Sharply Again In July

July saw another sharp drop in vehicle miles traveled (aka VMT) according to the Federal Highway Administration's monthly report on "Traffic Volume Trends."

Lost in all the news about the financial meltdown and the election is the report that Americans drove 3.6 percent less, or 9.6 billion miles fewer, in July 2008 than July 2007. Okay, maybe it wasn't lost in all the news -- it looks like the FHA didn't bother issuing a press release (see here). I guess even they are blasé about reductions in driving that just a few months ago would have been record-setting.
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Comments

[cynicalgal]

I'm learning to like my home town more...
Sarah Palin you disgust me. Read about Aerial Wolf Hunting:

http://www.Vaboomer.com

[mamacat]

I have witnessed that every time there is an economic slowdown, there is a drop in freeway traffic in Southern California relative to what the traffic volume was immediately prior to the economic slowdown. This does not mean that we have adopted more efficient ways of using resources, but rather that fewer people are using the freeways to get to work, because fewer people have jobs.

As Sen. Obama has said, we need to put people to work building a green infrastructure, especially during times of economic slowdown. Improving our methods of using resources can help end economic problems both in the short term and in the long term. We can't drill our way out of our problems, to borrow from Mr. T. Boone Pickens.

[Sadducee]

Driving less will happen when filling up your gas tank costs more than a car payment.

[TrooAmerican]

at 9,600,000,000 miles less driven, using a fairly high mpg average number of say 27mpg,

i calculate that saved 355,555,555 gallons of gasoline or 18,713,450 barrels of oil using the 19 gallons of gas refined available per barrel of oil. in one month. or over 600,000 barrels of oil per day.

Isnt that so much more significant than the piddly amount of oil that is theorized to be had in per day production 10 yrs from now off the coasts of America?

[KillTheMessenger]

And as you can see... oil prices are down significantly. Now, if our legislators had the cohones (where is Mrs. Clinton and her pair?) to slap a gas tax on that makes gas at least $8/gallon, no matter what the price of oil, we'd be one step further down the road.

[jake106]

That is such a ridiculous proposition. You would destroy the middle class immediatly. I mean completely destroy them.

Listen, it would be great if everyone could ride a bike or mass transit to work. It needs to be done, in my opinion. Every medium to large city in this country should be working towards that goal. But it doesn't happen overnight. I live in a town where everything is spread out, there is a barely functioning shuttle bus as "public transportation", and for four months of the year, the temperatures are in the 110 and above region. You make gas 8 dollars a gallon and my family can't survive. Period. We've cut down our driving as much as we can already, there isn't anything else that we can cut out. I'm already biking 15-20 miles a day, should my wife and three kids have to do the same? In 115 degrees?

In a word, no. And you don't get the right to say otherwise.

[TrooAmerican]

yeah, but i actually wouldnt be able to get to work at all then and i commute 35miles each way and have a family to support and cant move, and cant get much of any job where i am located. so ..please no. no extra balls for a gas tax right now. If someone would donate one of those EV1s to me that arent destroyed, then tax all you want.