8 Jul
2002
8 Jul
'02
2:43 p.m.
Sorry for interject with another Census 2000 related question:
According to the newly released Census 2000 Urbanized Area data, Los
Angels - Long Beach - Santa Ana, CA is the most densely populated urban
area in the United States with 7,068 persons per square mile.
True or False?
Well, we fought the UZA definition and lost. Now we have to explain the
ill-defined term and make some sense out of this new ranking by
density.
By the way, Chicago, IL - IN is the second largest Urbanized Area by
Land Area.
Sweson Yang, AICP
Chief Transportation Planner
Indianapolis Metro Planning Organization
200 E. Washington St., Suite 1841
Indianapolis, IN 46204
(317) 327-5137t co
>> "Alan E. Pisarski"
<PISARSKI(a)ix.netcom.com> 07/08/02 01:17PM >>>
MY GREAT CONCERN IS
THAT WE WILL HAVE FOUR DATA SETS BY NEXT YEAR - THE
C2SS
FOR 2000, THE CENSUS JTW FOR 2000, THE NEW ACS-SS01 SURVEY AND THE
NPTS -everyone will be able to pick their favorite and spin forever as
Ed
says. We must understand the linkages and differences or we will
expire.
AEP
----- Original Message -----
From: ed christopher <edc(a)berwyned.com>
Cc: <ctpp-news(a)chrispy.net>
Sent: Monday, July 08, 2002 1:33 PM
Subject: Re: [CTPP] Reconciling Census Transit Commuters with
Ridership
Statistics
Chris I thought your comment about the census data
being flawed was a
bit
strong and way off the point of what Chuck was raising
here. You and Ken may have your beef with arguing for
specific
projects
but I believe what Chuck was doing was trying to get folks to
begin thinking how we can reconcile the differences
between the
various
data sets. I don't think that arguing about the integrity of
the data--one versus the other is really the way to
go. I am sure
that
most transit ridership count programs have their own warts.
This is why planners need to understand what is behind
the numbers
they
use and stay away from working the "spin" game. To complicate
this even more, toss in a household travel survey and
several transit
on
board surveys and the mix becomes all that more interesting.
Wouldn't it serve the planning community better to fully understand
and
quantify the differences between the data sets? We know there
is variability in peoples travel.
Now here is a wild thought (although I say it tongue-in-check). Maybe
the
people who take transit one or two days a week or for part
of their trip are doing it for altruistic reasons.
Since they know
transit may get short shifted they overlook their auto travel and
say they used transit most of the time on their census
form. Its
just a
thought.
As for Chucks comments I believe that he was actually searching to
gain a
better understanding into the trip purpose side of mode
split issue. Is the the work trip declining in its
mode share? The
answer of course in not in any census data.
Forinash.Christopher(a)epamail.epa.gov wrote:
> Isn't another piece of the explanation that the Census doesn't
actually
> measure trip-making as we typically define it?
The Census
mode-to-work
> question is an odd thing -- see
> http://www.census.gov/dmd/www/pdf/d02p.pdf questions 23a&b. The
Census
> day was 4/1/2000, and it asks "how did this
person usually get to
work
> LAST WEEK?", and requires a one-mode answer
(with "most distance"
the
> criteria for choosing main mode). So for a
number of individuals
and
> families with whome I am anecdotally familiar,
you don't count
transit
> even if you use it quite a bit. If you walk to
transit to and from
work
> 2 days a week and drive the others, you don't
report transit. If
you
> carpool to a parking location and then take
transit to your office
every
> day, you don't report transit. If you drive
from Loudoun County VA
to
> the Vienna METRO to downtown Washington DC every
day, you don't
report
> transit. So aren't the Census numbers ALWAYS
going to be biased
toward
> the "dominant" mode (unless everyone
does the same thing every
single
> day)? As others have posted, there are other
reasons for
disagreement
> between Census travel trends and all other
sources, but this is
clearly
> one.
>
> Lots of people seek smart growth locations for home and work
> specifically to have access to transportation choices. That
doesn't
> mean that every day, or even the majority of
days, they won't
drive. I
> ranted a bit about this a couple weeks ago in
response to Ken
Orski's
> flippant post to a thread started by Chuck
Purvis. Using these
flawed
> Census numbers to argue for further depriving
people of
transportation
> choices is completely outdated thinking.
>
> Chris.
> ------------------------------------
> Christopher V. Forinash
> U.S. EPA: Office of Policy, Economics and Innovation
> 1200 Pennsylvania Ave NW (MC 1808), Washington DC 20460
> (Delivery: 401 M St. SW, #WT-1013D)
> 202-260-5044 vox 0174 fax; forinash.christopher(a)epa.gov
> ------------------------------------
> Development, Community & Environment Division:
> http://www.epa.gov/smartgrowth
> A partner in the Smart Growth Network: http://www.smartgrowth.org
>
>
> "Gardner, John
> F" To: 'Chuck
Purvis'
<CPurvis(a)mtc.ca.gov>ov>, ctpp-news(a)chrispy.net
> <GardnerJF(a)dot.s
cc:
> tate.sc.us> Subject: RE: [CTPP]
Reconciling Census Transit Commuters with Ridership St atistics
> Sent by:
> owner-ctpp-news@
> chrispy.net
>
>
> 07/08/2002 08:14
> AM
>
>
>
> Another explanation for the growth in total unlinked passenger
trips,
> while
> total transit commuters remained stable, is the shift toward rail
> transit by
> many of the growing transit systems. In many cases, light rail
replaced
> express bus service. The express bus collected
people in their
> neighborhoods or at a park and ride lot and was a "one-seat" trip.
Rail
> often involves a transfer from a feeder bus to
the train, so a trip
that
> formerly counted as one unlinked passenger trip
now counts as two.
A
> better
> measure would be "linked trips" (excludes transfers) when making
this
> comparison, but I don't believe they are
reported.
>
> John Gardner, AICP
> SCDOT Office of Planning
> PO Box 191
> Columbia, SC 29202-0191
> (803) 737 - 1444
> gardnerjf(a)dot.state.sc.us
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Chuck Purvis [mailto:CPurvis@mtc.ca.gov]
> Sent: Wednesday, July 03, 2002 6:36 PM
> To: ctpp-news(a)chrispy.net
> Subject: [CTPP] Reconciling Census Transit Commuters with
Ridership
> Statistics
>
> To: CTPP-News
>
> One of the interesting journey-to-work results is the lack of
change, at
> the
> NATIONAL level, in the total number of transit commuters. The US
had
> 6,069,589 transit commuters according to the 1990
Census, and
6,067,703
> transit commuters according to the 2000 Census, a
0.03 percent
decrease.
> (On
> the other hand, the US transit commute SHARE declined from 5.3
percent
> in
> 1990 to 4.7 percent in 2000.)
>
> This compares to national transit ridership statistics which show a
6.4
> percent increase in annual unlinked passenger
trips comparing 1990
to
> 2000.
> (Source is APTA's 2002 Public Transportation Fact Book, Table 26.)
The
> APTA
> book (I would assume based on FTA-collected ridership statistics)
shows
> annual unlinked public transit trips increasing
from 8,799 million
trips
> in
> 1990 to 9,363 million trips in 2000 (the 2000 numbers are
preliminary,
> according to the 2002 APTA Fact Book).
>
> So, an issue is how to reconcile a 0.0 percent change in national
> transit
> commuters with a 6.4 percent increase in national transit
ridership.
>
> A plausible explanation is that the work trip share of public
> transportation
> trips has declined since 1990. According to the 1990 NPTS, 42.6
percent
> of
> public transportation person trips are for the purpose of "earning
a
> living"
> (NPTS Databook, Vol. 1, Table 4.40).
>
> So, I can calculate that about 3,748 million unlinked transit
boardings
> (in
> 1990) are "work trips" and that this might decline to about 3,747
> million
> unlinked transit boarding "work trips", in 2000. This means that
perhaps
> 40
> percent of year 2000 transit boardings are work trips (3,747 /
9,363),
> which
> is quite plausible at the national level.
>
> The story might be that the national number of transit work trips,
1990
> to
> 2000, has remained fairly stable, and that, at least at the
national
> level,
> the growth in transit is attributable to non-work travel.
>
> The data question is: is information available from either the 1995
NPTS
> or
> the 2001 NHTS that can corroborate this possible trend - - a
decline in
> the
> work purpose share for public transportation trips?
>
> Also, who has attempted to reconcile their change in regional
transit
> commuters with their own transit ridership
statistics? What would
be
> most
> helpful is any comparisons of on-board surveys or household travel
> surveys
> that show any changes in the trip purpose mix for transit trips.
>
> (Other larger issues still loom in terms of the
plausibility/fixability
> of
> the Census data. We are very concerned about the overall LOW
numbers of
> TOTAL commuters and employed residents we're
seeing in the 2000
Census
in
our region....)
Wishing a Safe & Sane Happy Fourth of July to All!
Chuck Purvis
***********************************************
Charles L. Purvis, AICP
Senior Transportation Planner/Analyst
Metropolitan Transportation Commission
101 Eighth Street
Oakland, CA 94607-4700
(510) 464-7731 (office)
(510) 464-7848 (fax)
www: http://www.mtc.ca.gov/
Census WWW: http://census.mtc.ca.gov/
***********************************************
--
Ed Christopher
Metropolitan Activities
Midwest Resource Center
Federal Highway Administration
19900 Governors Drive
Olympia Fields, Illinois 60461
708-283-3534 (V)
708-283-3501 (F)
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