IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cdl/uctcwp/qt31m0w2x3.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The impact of residential density on vehicle usage and fuel consumption

Author

Listed:
  • Kim, Jinwon
  • Brownstone, David

Abstract

This paper investigates the impact of residential density on vehicle usage and fuel consumption. The empirical model accounts for both residential self-selection effects and non-random missing data problems. While most previous studies focus on a specific region, this paper analyzes national level data from the 2001 National Household Travel Survey. Comparing two households that are equal in all respects except residential density, the household residing in an area that is 1000 housing units per square mile denser (roughly 50% of the sample average) will drive 1500 (7.8%) less miles per year and will consume 70 (7.5%) fewer gallons of fuel than the household in the less dense area. The effect of the contextual density measure (density in the context of its surrounding area) is quantitatively larger than the sole effect of residential density. A simulation moving a household from suburban to urban area reduces household annual mileage by 15%.

Suggested Citation

  • Kim, Jinwon & Brownstone, David, 2010. "The impact of residential density on vehicle usage and fuel consumption," University of California Transportation Center, Working Papers qt31m0w2x3, University of California Transportation Center.
    • Handle: RePEc:cdl:uctcwp:qt31m0w2x3
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/31m0w2x3.pdf;origin=repeccitec
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hausman, Jerry, 2015. "Specification tests in econometrics," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 38(2), pages 112-134.
    2. Bhat, Chandra R. & Guo, Jessica Y., 2007. "A comprehensive analysis of built environment characteristics on household residential choice and auto ownership levels," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 41(5), pages 506-526, June.
    3. Bento, Antonio M. & Cropper, Maureen L. & Mobarak, Ahmed Mushfiq & Vinha, Katja, 2003. "The impact of urban spatial structure on travel demand in the United States," Policy Research Working Paper Series 3007, The World Bank.
    4. Brownstone, David & Golob, Thomas F., 2009. "The impact of residential density on vehicle usage and energy consumption," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(1), pages 91-98, January.
    5. Boarnet, Marlon & Crane, Randall, 2001. "The influence of land use on travel behavior: specification and estimation strategies," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 35(9), pages 823-845, November.
    6. Heckman, James, 2013. "Sample selection bias as a specification error," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 31(3), pages 129-137.
    7. Matthew E. Kahn, 2000. "The environmental impact of suburbanization," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 19(4), pages 569-586.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Gillingham, Kenneth & Munk-Nielsen, Anders, 2019. "A tale of two tails: Commuting and the fuel price response in driving," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 27-40.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kim, Jinwon & Brownstone, David, 2013. "The impact of residential density on vehicle usage and fuel consumption: Evidence from national samples," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 196-206.
    2. Kim, Jinwon, 2012. "Endogenous vehicle-type choices in a monocentric city," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(4), pages 749-760.
    3. Brownstone, David & Golob, Thomas F., 2009. "The impact of residential density on vehicle usage and energy consumption," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(1), pages 91-98, January.
    4. Andrew Perumal & David Timmons, 2017. "Contextual Density and US Automotive CO2 Emissions across the Rural–Urban Continuum," International Regional Science Review, , vol. 40(6), pages 590-615, November.
    5. Kim, Jinwon, 2016. "Vehicle fuel-efficiency choices, emission externalities, and urban sprawl," Economics of Transportation, Elsevier, vol. 5(C), pages 24-36.
    6. Devajyoti Deka, 2014. "The Living, Moving and Travel Behaviour of the Growing American Solo: Implications for Cities," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 51(4), pages 634-654, March.
    7. Dillon, Harya S. & Saphores, Jean-Daniel & Boarnet, Marlon G., 2015. "The impact of urban form and gasoline prices on vehicle usage: Evidence from the 2009 National Household Travel Survey," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 23-33.
    8. Naveen Eluru & Chandra Bhat & Ram Pendyala & Karthik Konduri, 2010. "A joint flexible econometric model system of household residential location and vehicle fleet composition/usage choices," Transportation, Springer, vol. 37(4), pages 603-626, July.
    9. Jinhyun Hong & Qing Shen & Lei Zhang, 2014. "How do built-environment factors affect travel behavior? A spatial analysis at different geographic scales," Transportation, Springer, vol. 41(3), pages 419-440, May.
    10. Campbell, Randall C. & Nagel, Gregory L., 2016. "Private information and limitations of Heckman's estimator in banking and corporate finance research," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 186-195.
    11. Marcela Parada-Contzen & Andrés Riquelme-Won & Felipe Vasquez-Lavin, 2013. "The value of a statistical life in Chile," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 45(3), pages 1073-1087, December.
    12. Rodríguez-Pose, Andrés & Tselios, Vassilis & Winkler, Deborah & Farole, Thomas, 2013. "Geography and the Determinants of Firm Exports in Indonesia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 225-240.
    13. Xiaohong Chen & Andres Santos, 2018. "Overidentification in Regular Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 86(5), pages 1771-1817, September.
    14. Chetan Doddamani & M. Manoj, 2023. "Analysis of the influences of built environment measures on household car and motorcycle ownership decisions in Hubli-Dharwad cities," Transportation, Springer, vol. 50(1), pages 205-243, February.
    15. Jia, Lili, 2012. "Land fragmentation and off-farm labor supply in China," Studies on the Agricultural and Food Sector in Transition Economies, Leibniz Institute of Agricultural Development in Transition Economies (IAMO), volume 66, number 66.
    16. Andreas Wagner & Denise Fischer‐Kreer, 2024. "The role of CEO regulatory focus in increasing or reducing corporate carbon emissions," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(2), pages 1051-1065, February.
    17. Jessica L. Darby & David J. Ketchen & Brent D. Williams & Travis Tokar, 2020. "The Implications of Firm‐Specific Policy Risk, Policy Uncertainty, and Industry Factors for Inventory: A Resource Dependence Perspective," Journal of Supply Chain Management, Institute for Supply Management, vol. 56(4), pages 3-24, October.
    18. Shekar Bose & Amina Marhoon Rashid Al Naabi & Houcine Boughanmi & Jaynab Begum Yousuf, 2019. "Domestic Ban Versus Border Rejections: A Case of Oman’s Fish Exports to the EU," SAGE Open, , vol. 9(1), pages 21582440188, January.
    19. Verbeek, M.J.C.M. & Nijman, T.E., 1992. "Incomplete panels and selection bias : A survey," Discussion Paper 1992-7, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
    20. Amalesh Sharma & V. Kumar & Jun Yan & Sourav Bikash Borah & Anirban Adhikary, 2019. "Understanding the structural characteristics of a firm’s whole buyer–supplier network and its impact on international business performance," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 50(3), pages 365-392, April.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Social and Behavioral Sciences;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cdl:uctcwp:qt31m0w2x3. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Lisa Schiff (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/itucbus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.