How fast is the UK making the transition towards shared transport? Mobilityways’ Commuter Census tracks travel trends every 12 months, but this year the results are worrying.
Mobilityways has once again analysed the responses of thousands of commuters in the UK to reveal current attitudes towards sustainable commuting. The following year-on-year analysis is based on responses from 5,166 members of the Mobilityways Liftshare car-sharing communities.
Download the full census here.
This year, the Commuter Census results are stark: while the number of people carpooling and driving alone in EVs has risen, the amount of respondents using all other sustainable transport modes has fallen and driving alone has increased for the first time since 2022.
At 40%, driving alone in a petrol or diesel car remains the single-most popular form of commuting, and its popularity has unfortunately risen since last year. In the meantime, however, carpooling continues to rise beyond last year – and beyond pre-pandemic levels – for the first time, with 16% of participants saying they now carpool to work.
Other sustainable methods of transport have sadly decreased slightly in popularity, as the numbers of bus and train users and walkers have fallen.
Meanwhile, Commuter Census respondents have continued to move away from a preference for home working, as 49% of workers would now prefer to work from site for more than half the week. The dial has otherwise not shifted on hybrid working, as employees are still working from home for an average of 1.6 days a week, exactly the same as last year – contrary to accounts of workers returning to the office en masse.
While we were reporting the success of the £2 bus cap in Commuter Census 2024, the new £3 bus cap has affected this, with bus use decreasing by almost a fifth since then.
More positively, however, EV usage is now rising after it plateaued in 2024. This year has seen an increase in both EV and hybrid vehicle commuting across drive alone and carpooling. Contributing factors are the price compared to diesel and petrol engines slowly coming down and EV charging stations continuing to be rolled out.
