Getting Around When You’re Just Getting By: The Travel Behavior and Transportation Expenditures of Low-Income Adults

Abstract

How much do people with limited resources pay for cars, public transit, and other means of travel? How does their transportation behavior change during periods of falling employment and rising fuel prices? This research uses in-depth interviews with 73 adults to examine how rising transportation costs affect low-income families. The interviews examine four general areas of interest: travel behavior and transportation spending patterns; the costs and benefits of alternative modes of travel; cost management strategies; and opinions about the effects of changing transportation prices on travel behavior. Key findings include: 1. Most low-income households are concerned about their transportation costs; 2. Low-income individuals actively and strategically manage their household resources in order to survive on very limited means and to respond to changes in income or transportation costs; 3. In making mode-choice decisions, low-income travelers, like higher-income travelers, carefully evaluate the costs of travel (time and out-of-pocket expenses) against the benefits of alternative modes available to them; 4. Some low-income individuals in the sample were willing to accept higher transportation expenditures - such as the costs of auto ownership or congestion tolls - if they believed that they currently benefit or would potentially benefit from the increased expenses; 5. Although low-income households find ways to cover their transportation expenditures, many of these strategies have negative effects on their lifestyles. The report concludes with recommendations for increasing transportation affordability, minimizing the impact of new transportation taxes or fees on low-income people, and developing new research and data collection strategies.

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