The scene in Market Square during 2024’s Bike to Work Day

Our annual analysis of how residents commute in the 60 largest US cities focuses on post-pandemic changes

The Covid pandemic caused shockwaves in all aspects of life. Not only did it change how people commute to their jobs, but also where those jobs are located. Notably, there has been no greater shift in how and where people work than those who now work from home (WFH) compared to pre-pandemic times. Pittsburgh is on the upper end of WFH cities, and the ripple effect has upended transit service and central business district economies not only here, but across the country. We’re just finding out about the 2023 numbers that provide us with some insights about how US workers now get to their jobs.

According to the US Census’ American Community Survey (ACS, 1-year estimate), in 2019 about 7% of Pittsbughers worked from home. Today (2023), that number is 18%, two and a half times more people than before the pandemic a mere five years ago. Of the 60 largest US cities, Pittsburgh ranks 9th out of the largest 60 cities in the number of people who work from home.

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For those who are leaving their home to go to work, the biggest shakeup in Pittsburgh unfortunately remains our transit mode share, going from 17.3% of Pittsburgh workers in 2019 to 13.6% in the latest stats.

One positive effect of the realignment is that fewer Pittsburghers are driving solo to work today than in 2019, going from 54.1% to below half for the first time. This is interesting because the number of Pittsburgh workers with access to a vehicle ticked up slightly, as did the number who use a taxi or ride hailing. 

While the number of Pittsburghers who walked to work dropped about two percentage points, we still remain one of the the top cities in the country for workers who walk to their job.

Which brings us to bicycling. Initially, like the other modes that brought workers to their jobs, the pandemic caused an initial drop in the number of bike commuters. However, now that we are no longer living in a pandemic, bicycling to work has rebounded to the same rate as it was pre-Covid, despite all the other modes besides taxis taking significant hits. For comparison, other cities did not recover their bicycling mode share as Pittsburgh has done. For example, Minneapolis for years was the model midwest biking city, recording 3.9% of their workers bicycling as their primary means to get to work in 2019. That city’s bicycle mode share is a 1.8% today – now only slightly ahead of Pittsburgh.

A number of factors could contribute to bike commuting’s rise in Pittsburgh including fewer cars on the street, greater acceptance of cyclists by drivers, the popularity of e-bikes, and consistent improvements to bike infrastructure and a lower stress network of streets. Anecdotally, more people seem to be riding bikes for recreation as well, which also has a mainstreaming effect on riding and as well as a safety in numbers effect (more cyclists make it safer for all riders, commuters included). More analysis would need to be done to study the effects and how well they predict this higher bike commuting rate.

The drop in the percentage of Pittsburghers who drive to work should also be looked at more closely. In 2019, 62% of Pittsburghers used a personal motor vehicle to get to their job, dropping to just 55% in 2023. Furthermore, in 2023, approximately a quarter of Pittsburgh workers who left their home for a job didn’t use a personal motor vehicle as their primary means to get there. 

This translates to roughly 10,000 fewer Pittsburghers driving to work everyday in a personal motor vehicle than before the pandemic, even though more workers now have access to a vehicle according to the ACS. 

We’re only now seeing the full impact of the pandemic on all aspects of daily life. How we choose to get to work is no exception. With fewer people driving (and parking), maybe it’s time to truly make that shift from an auto-centric policy to one that better reflects our new multimodal reality.

What is the ACS?

The American Community Survey (ACS) is the country’s largest household survey, gathering data from workers that live in their city and how they get to their job, wherever that may be. The ACS reports its findings yearly. With a sample size of about 3 million addresses, this is only an estimate, but is by far the best tool that we have for understanding trends in the United States. The survey uses questionnaires and interviews to gather information on demographic, economic, and housing characteristics.

Reference Points

Results are based on a survey that asks a subset of the larger population questions about their previous week of travel.

The ACS asks only about commuting, it does not tell us about bicycling and transportation for non-work purposes. This leaves out a significant group of people and only paints a small part of the true transportation picture.

When asking about an individual’s journey to work, the survey asks about “the primary mode of transportation to work,” and can only pick the single longest leg of their journey. This wording undercounts the actual amount of bike commuting as it does not consider people who ride only a few times a week, or who utilize multimodal transit, such as biking to a bus stop.

It is important to remember that these are estimates. The ACS does release a margin of error metric along with each estimate, which individuals can use to find the interval in which the ACS is 90% confident that the estimate lies within. This can be done by adding and subtracting the margin of error value from the estimate using the data on the ACS site.

Surveys take place throughout the year. This helps mitigate the problem that occurs with people changing the mode of transport based on the season/weather conditions but doesn’t resolve it fully.

Yearly changes may not be statistically significant.

The numbers reported here are for the “principal city,” not the larger Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA), which means we’re only counting how residents of Pittsburgh get to their job, wherever that may be.

The 2023 numbers are the latest from the US Census. We’ll see the 2024 numbers in September and December of 2025.

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