Traffic Drops Off After December Holidays; Volume Decreases for Month of January by 1.6 Percent

Vehicle Miles Driven by Region (in millions)
	January 2009	January 2010	Percent Change
Northeast	32,439	32,902	+1.4
South Atlantic	50,153	48,722	-2.9
North Central	49,798	49,942	+0.3
South Gulf	46,592	45,044	-3.3
West	47,530	46,197	-2.8
Total	226,591	222,806	-1.6

Traffic Drops Off After December Holidays; Volume Decreases for Month of January by 1.6 Percent
March 29, 2010

The Federal Highway Administration (FHA) estimates that January 2010 started with a 1.6 percent decrease in vehicle miles driven compared January of 2009, in what proves to be a disappointing drop after the rush of holiday travel. The FHA, a division of the Department of Transportation, tracks both monthly travel on U.S. roadways, along with cumulative travel throughout the year.

This reversed the trend that appeared throughout the last nine months of 2009; October was the only month between April 2009 and the end of the year that traffic was down from 2008. (CLICK HERE for related story.)

Regionally, vehicle traffic was down for all regions except the North Central and Northeast regions (see chart to the right).

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