Timothy Stolz

Traffic Volume Continues to Fall in August; What Will Happen in the Coming Months?

Thank you for the statistics as it gives us all cause to stop and think. Short of doing multiple surveys, all we can do is offer a conjecture on how drivers might respond.
There will be a certain percentage of drivers who have found alternative or public transportation to be of a benefit and they will no longer be counted in driving miles. Others will abandon their fuel saving "experiments in saving gas" and go back to their heavy footed driving habits. Those drivers that bought into the idea of $147 per barrel oil as the new world order now have nice new fuel efficient cars to drive which with cheaper gas prices will take even longer to pay for themselves.
The real question shall be "At what point will the volume of miles driven by new drivers cross the apex of miles saved by all of the methods so attributed to milage savings?" The answer to that question then becomes the level where the graph above begins to go up. The reduced milage from demand destruction may still be ongoing, as will the reduction from public transportation and other like methods; but the graph goes up as does the gross number of miles driven.
At any rate, I think we can count on the American consumer, or at least a sufficient number of them, to be predictable and return to their wasteful driving habits.