Two in three Australians drive to work, study of commuting habits finds

Updated

Nearly two in three Australians drive to work in a private car while only one in 10 commuters relies on public transport, a study of census data has found.

Meanwhile, there are 13.3 million registered vehicles in Australia, amounting to one vehicle for every 1.37 people of driving age.

And fewer than one in 10 households gets by without a car, according to social research company McCrindle, which analysed data compiled by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

Of all adult Australians in full-time work or study, more than seven in 10 (71 per cent) primarily use a passenger vehicle to commute, and nearly nine in 10 adults (88 per cent) use a car to get to places other than work.

The study found an 0.8 per cent increase in the number of car commuters compared with five years ago, amounting to 655,939 people daily..

The only three commuting methods to have declined in share are walking (down by 3 per cent), going as a car passenger (down by 0.6 per cent) and going by motorcycle or scooter (down by 0.1 per cent).

One in five train commuters also uses a car for part of their journey, while one in 10 bus passengers did the same.

More than half of Australians (50 per cent) said the reason they did not use public transport was that no service existed or, where it did, the times did not suit their needs.

Meanwhile, the average Australian car is driven 12,881 kilometres a year, meaning Australians in their combined 13 million vehicles drive a combined 167 billion kilometres annually - the equivalent of driving to Pluto and back 20 times a year.

More drivers in Sydney, but Melbourne tops car commute

A disproportionate number of Melbournians drive to work - 107,792 more than do in Sydney, even though Sydney has 400,000 more people, the research found.

However, Melbourne has more bicycle commuters than any other city in Australia (25,594), and 41 per cent of all women who ride to work in Australia live in Melbourne.

And more cars are used to transport Sydneysiders to work than there were used by commuters in the states of Western Australia, South Australia, Northern Territory and Tasmania combined.

Equally, Sydney has as many people who get to work by train (almost 187,760) as the rest of Australia combined.

Other key points of the research included that:

Sydney, Brisbane and Perth are the only capitals where bicycles are not in the top-five means of getting to work;

More Sydneysiders get to work by truck (21,445) than by bicycle (18,811);

Hobart residents are more likely to drop someone to work;

Brisbane has two million fewer people than Melbourne but 1,725 more motorcycle commuters

Far more men than women catch ferries, but far more women than men catch trams

Men are more likely to drive, and women are far more likely to be passengers

NT is the "walk to work capital"

In Sydney, the commutes of 27 workers involved a bus, car and bicycle

Topics: environment, work, road-transport, rail-transport, transport, australia, act, nsw, nt, qld, sa, tas, vic, wa

First posted