Research Design Connection: Commuting and Control and Wellbeing
Smith’s work verifies that having a comfortable level of control over our lives increases our wellbeing, and it also supports adding bicycle storage rooms to office buildings. Smith found that “Active travelers are happiest with their commute trips…For car and transit commuters, traffic congestion significantly decreases commute wellbeing, and using the trip productively increases commute wellbeing…Data were collected from a web-based survey of workers…in Portland, Oregon, U.S.A. with four modal groups: walk, bicycle, transit and car users…along with travel mode, traffic congestion, travel time, income, general health, attitudes about travel, job satisfaction and residential satisfaction also play important individual roles in shaping commute wellbeing…people who bike and walk to work are happier with their commutes and are relatively unaffected by traffic congestion compared to bus and car commuters.” Oliver Smith. 2017. “Commute Well-Being Differences by Mode: Evidence from Portland, Oregon, USA. Journal of Transport & Health, vol. 4, pp. 246-254. …
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