Access Across America: Transit 2022 measures access to jobs by public transit for each of the most populous US metropolitan areas and also shows the change in accessibility for each metro since the previous year. In 2022, all the top 50 US urban areas experienced a year-over-year decline in transit access to jobs. This was due to declining general job availability and density as economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic were felt, and to changes in transit service frequency and availability in response.
The first nine of the top ten metro areas for access to jobs by transit remained unchanged from the previous year. Among them, Boston, which had a 9% decrease, and Seattle, with a decrease of 10%, were among cities with the smallest changes in accessibility to jobs via transit. Approximately 40,368 jobs were accessible by a 30-minute transit trip in Boston and 29,771 jobs in Seattle. By comparison, about 169,177 jobs were accessible by a 30-minute transit trip in the New York metro area, which decreased by 23% but still remained the leader for access to jobs by transit.
Data for the annual reports is collected in January and continues to reflect the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. The vast majority of workers continued to travel to work on site throughout the COVID pandemic, and those that did travel to work were more likely to have lower incomes than those able to work remotely. Though the office commute was widely understood to be a larger share of transit ridership than it actually was, during 2022 transit primarily served “essential workers,” who by definition were not able to telework.
Public transit accounted for an estimated 5% of commuting trips in the United States before the COVID-19 pandemic, making it the second most widely used commute mode after driving.
This annual nationwide data is used to guide key transportation and land-use policy decisions. State departments of transportation, metropolitan planning organizations and transit agencies can apply the data to performance goals related to congestion, reliability and sustainability. In addition, detailed accessibility evaluation can help in selecting between project alternatives and prioritizing investments.
The research is sponsored by the National Accessibility Evaluation Pooled-Fund Study, a multi-year effort led by the Minnesota Department of Transportation and supported by partners including the Federal Highway Administration and additional state DOTs.
