WASHINGTON — Drivers waste nearly an entire work week each year sitting in traffic on the way to and from their jobs, according to a national study released Tuesday.
But a city in Eastern Washington clocked in as one of the least congested in the country.
U.S. drivers languished in traffic delays for a total of 4.2 billion hours in 2005, up from 4 billion the year before, according to the Texas Traffic Institute’s urban mobility report. That’s about 38 hours per driver.
“Things are bad and they’re getting worse,” said Alan Pisarski, a transportation expert and the author of “Commuting in America.”
“We’ve used up the capacity that had been bequeathed to us by a previous generation, and we haven’t replaced it,” Pisarski said.
The study summed it up this way: “Too many people, too many trips over too short of a time period on a system that is too small.”
The study estimates that drivers wasted 2.9 billion gallons of fuel while sitting in traffic. Together with the lost time, traffic delays cost the nation $78.2 billion, the study estimates.
High gasoline prices appear to have cut into optional driving but not commuting to work, said David Schrank, an associate research scientist at the Texas Transportation Institute.
“We’re really not seeing drops in the peak travel times,” said Schrank, a co-author of the study.
About three-quarters of all commuters drive alone to work, according to census data.
The study provided detailed information on traffic congestion in the nation’s 85 largest metropolitan areas.
The Los Angeles metro area had the worst congestion, delaying drivers an average of 72 hours a year. It was followed by Atlanta, San Francisco, Washington and Dallas.
Atlanta has seen some improvement, according to the study. In 2005, Atlanta drivers wasted an average of 60 hours a year in traffic delays — down from 70 hours a decade earlier.
The least congested metro areas were Brownsville, Texas, and Spokane, where drivers were delayed an average of eight hours a year.
The study offers a menu of options for addressing congestion, including adding roads or lanes where needed, improving public transportation and changing driving patterns through flexible work schedules, telecommuting and car pooling.
“The problem has grown too rapidly and is too complex for only one technology or service to be ‘the solution’ in most regions,” the report said.
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