Long-Distance and Rural Travel Transferable Parameters for Statewide Travel Forecasting Models (2012)

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81 7.1 Comparisons Study findings were largely focused on the 1995 ATS for long-distance trips and 2009 NHTS for rural trip-making parameters. This section presents a few comparisons among the different surveys and travel parameters analyzed during this research. Originally, it was intended to look at the impacts on long-distance trip rates of proximity to areas with substantial tourist activity. Unfortunately, the ATS and NHTS databases do not include information on proximity of residence to “tourist areas.” Manual geocoding of known tourist sites was considered to analyze trip rates based on proximity to tourist areas; however, there were concerns about arbitrarily coming up with a list of tourist sites manually and pos- sibly excluding some regionally important tourist sites. National parks are obvious attractions and easily mapped as are locations of well-known nonurbanized tourist areas such as Branson, Gatlinburg, the Outer Banks, etc. However, should every amusement park in the United States be included in such an analysis? Also, the “production” of long-distance trips would not likely be influenced so much by proximity to tourist areas, as would be trip attractions. This topic might be worthy of another research effort to provide a more objective assessment of differing types and sizes of rural tourist destinations. Rural accessibility/proximity to employment was also considered; however, the NHTS 2009 database had limited data on work location. Instead, as discussed earlier in this report, proximity to urbanized areas was tracked in its relationship to rural trip production. Trip rates for long-distance and rural trips were provided from several different sources in this report. Table 7.1 presents overall long-distance person trip rates per household from the 1995 ATS, 2001 NHTS, and recent household GPS surveys. Annual rates from the ATS and NHTS were divided by 365 days and rounded to two decimal places to derive a daily rate for comparison against the recent GPS survey database. As indicated, all survey databases result in daily person long-distance trip rates of 0.03–0.04 per household. Likewise, total daily person rural trip rates were reported from several sources, including 2009 NHTS, Michigan DOT, and the GPS household survey database. As depicted in Table 7.2, person trip rates per rural household appear to be in a relatively similar range for different stratifications of 2009 NHTS, while different subareas and years from the Michigan and Ohio surveys tend to show lower household trip rates by comparison. Rural trip rates from the GPS household survey database fall within a similar range to the NHTS, Michigan, and Ohio household person trip rates. The impact of the recent economic recession on 2009 NHTS trip rates is unknown at this time and beyond the scope of this research effort. C h a p t e r 7 Comparisons and Conclusions

82 Long-Distance and rural travel transferable parameters for Statewide travel Forecasting Models 7.2 Conclusions A brief summary of findings and key conclusions based on survey analyses are presented below in bullet format for ease of reference, with long-distance trips discussed first, followed by rural trips. • Long-distance trip rates are generally consistent when compared among several data sources and years. The percentage of long-distance trips by purpose/type appears consistent between the 1995 ATS and 2001 NHTS long-distance component, based on analysis conducted specifi- cally for this study as follows: – Business—28.38 percent for NHTS 2001 versus 22.25 percent for ATS; – Pleasure—54.84 percent for NHTS 2001 versus 58.97 percent for ATS; and – Personal Business—16.78 percent for NHTS 2001 versus 18.78 percent for ATS. • Long-distance trips are generally longest for business purposes (954 miles) and shortest for personal business (704 miles), with pleasure trip lengths in the middle of the others (828 miles). • Auto occupancy rates are considerably higher for long-distance trips (3.10) than urban or rural travel (1.54), lowest for long-distance business trips (2.11), and higher for other long- distance types (3.33–3.46). • Private automobile is the dominant transportation mode for long-distance travel (82 percent); however, trip length and purpose/type figure prominently in shifting to air travel. • Rural trip rates vary somewhat among different data sources; household trip rates from Michigan and Ohio surveys are generally lower than those from the 2009 NHTS, as depicted in Table 7.2. • Rural trip rates (9.69) appear lower than suburban area trip rates (10.34), but otherwise, are not that different from urban trip rates (9.36–9.50), using statistics based on one of several stratifications found in Appendix G. • The percentage of rural work trips (12 percent) appears to be less than that experienced in most urban settings (typically 15–20 percent). Survey Data Source Daily Person Trips per Householda 1995 ATS 0.03 2001 NHTS 0.03 Recent GPS Household Surveys 0.04 (average of four surveys) aAnnual trip rates were divided by 365 for 1995 ATS and 2001 NHTS, rounded to hundredths. Table 7.1. Comparative long-distance household trip rates. Daily Person Trips per Household 2009 NHTS 9.78-10.06 (dependent on stratification) Michigan Travel Counts Surveys 7.64-9.41 (dependent on area and year) Ohio Statewide Household Travel Survey 7.78 (no substratifications) GPS Surveys 8.24-13.56 Table 7.2. Range of comparative rural household trip rates.

Comparisons and Conclusions 83 • Rural trip travel times (19–24 minutes, nonwork versus work) are generally shorter than urbanized areas with 1 million plus population and subway or rail (20–32 minutes, nonwork versus work). • Rural auto occupancy rates (1.54) are generally higher than small- and medium-sized urban- ized areas (1.49–1.52) but equal to or lower than the largest metropolitan areas (1.54–1.63). It is strongly suggested that the rates provided in this study from the 1995 ATS for long- distance travel and 2009 NHTS for rural travel be considered for use where local trip rates are not available. Other trip rates in this report, including secondary source parameters (Michigan, Ohio, Canadian surveys, GPS surveys) and NHTS 2001 statistics, are provided for comparative purposes only.