From Home to Office: Inside DC’s Journey to Work
With the proliferation of ride sharing apps, bike lanes, and telecommuting, the residents of Washington, DC commute to work in a variety of methods.
While the majority of DC residents drive cars to work as their main mode of transportation, commuting by car has fallen by nearly 10%, from 49.4% in 2000 to 40.8% in 2013. Almost as many workers now take Metrobus or Metrorail (38.4%) as drive (40.8%).
Meanwhile, working from home and bicycling are growing trends in the journey to work for DC residents. Working from home has seen a 50% increase from 2000 to 2013, and during the same time period biking more than doubled with a 122% increase.
Two wheels instead of four
Biking to work continues as a growing trend with 3.6% of DC residents biking to work. With 10,891 cyclists on the road today, that is 2.2 times the number of bicyclists in 2000.
In Washington, DC, residents of the 20001 zip code have the highest concentration of bike riders at 8%. However, ZIP code 20009 puts the most bicyclists on the road with more 2,000 residents biking to work.
The ZIP codes east of the Anacostia River – 20032, 20019, 20020 – have the lowest rates of biking to work with <1%.
Sharing the journey by bus
More than 51,000 DC workers take the bus to their jobs, and it’s the third most popular form of transit to work after driving and Metrorail. 16.8% of DC employed residents take the bus to work.
The highest concentration of bus ridership is in ZIP code 20020, where 30% of residents take the bus to work. However, ZIP code 20011 – which includes parts of Petworth, Kennedy Street, Brightwood, and Fort Totten – has the highest number of bus riders at 7,200 employed residents taking the bus.
Riding the bus is least popular in ZIP code 20037, where only 3% of workers take the bus.