Telecommuting, Household Commute and Location Choice

Abstract

Previous empirical studies have made contributions to the understanding of the impact of telecommuting on individual travel patterns. There has been much less research that has examined the impact of telecommuting on commute travel at the household level. Using data from the 2001 and 2009 US National Household Travel Surveys, this study focuses on one-worker and two-worker households and investigates how telecommuting affects household one-way commute distance and duration. The results show that telecommuting increases the commute distance and duration for both one-worker households and two-worker households. It is also found that, in two-worker households, the telecommuting status of one worker does not increase the commute distance and duration of the other worker. These findings suggest that telecommuting (two-worker) households tend to choose locations involving a longer total one-way commute than non-telecommuting households, and this difference is largely due to the longer commute of their telecommuting members. © 2013 Urban Studies Journal Limited.