Virginia Transportation Modeling and Accessibility Program

News

• National Household Survey is undergoing in Virginia.

Survey Data Will Guide Transportation Investments in Virginia

Responses needed to help with nationwide survey on transportation

March 15, 2022 (Richmond, Virginia) – Reliable data about where people travel and how they get from place to place is essential for identifying transportation needs. Advanced technologies can count vehicles and project changes in population and congestion, but there is no substitute for information provided by real people when it comes to understanding driving, transit, bicycling and walking behavior.

The Virginia Department of Transportation is participating in the National Household Travel Survey and encourages residents throughout the state to help with this effort aimed at  better understanding how people travel in Virginia. The results will help officials and planners determine where and how to make transportation investments, such as bridges and  roads as well as facilities for bicycling, walking and transit.

The survey began in Virginia in January, when invitation letters were mailed to thousands of randomly selected households, and will last until January 2023. Although the selected households are not required to respond to the survey, a higher participation rate will yield more accurate data for future planning efforts.

Respondents will receive access to a secure website where they will be asked to answer questions about their household, vehicles and daily travel. The actual number of questions asked will depend on the size of the household and the extent to which each household travels. On average, the first part of the survey asks the selected households to answer 12-14 basic questions and takes just a few minutes. The second part of the survey takes about 15 minutes per household member, on average.

Every trip, no matter the destination or length, is important to document. Data about how people commute to work, when they stop at the grocery store and how children get to school is invaluable for transportation planners and policymakers who prioritize transportation projects and allocate funds.

The Federal Highway Administration has conducted the National Household Travel Survey every five to seven years since 1969 to learn more about the travel behavior of Americans. The yearlong data collection effort asks questions about how people travel, how often they drive, how they plan daily trips to run errands and whether they carpool or use alternative modes of transportation. Survey results help planners understand changing transportation needs nationwide and in communities. To learn more about the NHTS, visit https://nhts.ornl.gov/ .

• Travel demand model training for TransCAD GISDK was held from March 14th to March 22nd, 2022