Seattle's Traffic Rebound Is Slower Than Other Cities (Bellevue, Redmond: homes, gated)

[homesinseattle]

Article link here: https://patch.com/washington/seattle..._medium=mobile

“Seattle commuters navigated more traffic this year than earlier in the pandemic, but the rebound in Puget Sound congestion was less pronounced than what other major metro areas experienced, according to a new report.

INRIX, a Kirkland-based traffic analytics firm, released its annual Global Traffic Scorecard on Tuesday, detailing travel trends in hundreds of cities across the globe in 2021. The report focuses on four specific measures, ranking the busiest urban areas and travel corridors in the U.S., the most congested cities in the world, and detailing how downtown travel patterns have evolved.

As lockdowns and event restrictions of 2020 eased early this year, vaccines became more widely available, and more activities resumed, more drivers hit the road for travel and work. That was true in Seattle, but less so than in cities like New York and Chicago, which ranked as the nation's two most congested areas this year.

Some cities saw 2021 traffic surpass pre-pandemic levels, like in Las Vegas, where congestion soared 76 percent higher in 2021 than in 2019, INRIX found.

By contrast, INRIX found Seattle-area congestion was still 59 percent lower than in 2019, while trips to downtown were about 36 percent lower than before the pandemic. Seattle still ranks in the top 25 most congested U.S. cities, but in 2021 fell to 21st place, down from 15th in 2020.“

[Hemlock140]

My employer in Seattle, like Amazon, has the "return to office" scheduled for January 3, 2022. In our case most of the 600+ people will be allowed to work from home 2 days a week.

Amazon will allow many Seattle tech and corporate workers to continue working remotely indefinitely, as long as they can commute to the office "when necessary."

There are probably other Seattle employers doing the same or similar hybrid work locations. If so, that means it will take much longer for traffic to return to the 2019 normal, and it may not reach that level again if more employers relocate to other cities like Bellevue.

[Botev1912]

Originally Posted by homesinseattle

Article link here: https://patch.com/washington/seattle..._medium=mobile

“Seattle commuters navigated more traffic this year than earlier in the pandemic, but the rebound in Puget Sound congestion was less pronounced than what other major metro areas experienced, according to a new report.

INRIX, a Kirkland-based traffic analytics firm, released its annual Global Traffic Scorecard on Tuesday, detailing travel trends in hundreds of cities across the globe in 2021. The report focuses on four specific measures, ranking the busiest urban areas and travel corridors in the U.S., the most congested cities in the world, and detailing how downtown travel patterns have evolved.

As lockdowns and event restrictions of 2020 eased early this year, vaccines became more widely available, and more activities resumed, more drivers hit the road for travel and work. That was true in Seattle, but less so than in cities like New York and Chicago, which ranked as the nation's two most congested areas this year.

Some cities saw 2021 traffic surpass pre-pandemic levels, like in Las Vegas, where congestion soared 76 percent higher in 2021 than in 2019, INRIX found.

By contrast, INRIX found Seattle-area congestion was still 59 percent lower than in 2019, while trips to downtown were about 36 percent lower than before the pandemic. Seattle still ranks in the top 25 most congested U.S. cities, but in 2021 fell to 21st place, down from 15th in 2020.“

Seattle's mask riddance is also slower (or I should say 99% of people still hide their faces) than other cities even though it has higher vaccination rates than most of the country. The truth is people don't want to work in the office anymore because of fear. Seattle is nothing like pre-pandemic and it will take many years if not a decade for people to change their behavior. Perhaps time for relocation.

[homesinseattle]

Originally Posted by Botev1912

Seattle's mask riddance is also slower (or I should say 99% of people still hide their faces) than other cities even though it has higher vaccination rates than most of the country. The truth is people don't want to work in the office anymore because of fear. Seattle is nothing like pre-pandemic and it will take many years if not a decade for people to change their behavior. Perhaps time for relocation.

Seems sensible until we understand/get ahold of this Omicron variant.

[Guineas]

I am not WFH and living in an area that requires me to drive through the Mercer Mess everyday, I am happy there is less traffic haha.

But yeah some of my friends in tech live in a different world from me. They still have the bunker mentality.

[509]

That is because they ALL moved to eastern Washington!!!

The traffic has tripled in Wenatchee since the pandemic started.

[Botev1912]

Originally Posted by 509

That is because they ALL moved to eastern Washington!!!

The traffic has tripled in Wenatchee since the pandemic started.

Right, that's why the population here keeps increasing.

[leastprime]

I don't find the Seattle's traffic too terrible. It's the traffic into and outof Seattle that is bad.
Since we NEVER drive into Seattle, the "traffic" doesn't bother us. We take a STExpress bus on senior $1.00 fare.
DS and Spouse just moved out of CentralDistrict Seattle to Redmond. I doubt that they will do much in-Office work, not productive although might be helpful for advancement. If they must commute, I think they will have plenty of transit opportunities in ST54x, rideshare or a company bus; That 520 toll is not cheap during commuting hours unless in some form of multiple passenger vehicles.

[usernametaken]

Bellevue, Redmond and Kirkland seem back to same. The people working from home are going grocery shopping more frequently I guess.

[leastprime]

Originally Posted by Botev1912

Seattle's mask riddance is also slower (or I should say 99% of people still hide their faces) than other cities even though it has higher vaccination rates than most of the country. The truth is people don't want to work in the office anymore because of fear. Seattle is nothing like pre-pandemic and it will take many years if not a decade for people to change their behavior. Perhaps time for relocation.

A lot of established, highly educated, well paid, and data trained personnel, in the area. A manager could be risking group productivity if the directs get sick and perhaps die. If I was a manager in one of these companies, and direct gets sick-I would tell direct, that their job is "data" and they were stupid to take avoidable risk. Any Manager realizes, finding replacement takes enormous amount of time, coordination, and other's productivity.