Autosolism: in Montpellier and Toulouse, drivers too often drive alone in their car
The annual Vinci Autoroutes barometer reports the percentage of drivers who travel alone by car when commuting to work. A figure up on last year, despite the boom in soft mobility.
At a time when soft mobility is available on the coast in major French cities, the car is still a widely popular means of transport for commuting. Problem, the vast majority of these trips are made by drivers alone in their vehicles.
Witness the second barometer de Vinci Autoroutes, published this Tuesday, September 20, on solo driving. The fact of traveling alone by car. And the figures are quite eloquent on the travel habits of the French. Thus “out of a million vehicles analyzed, only 14.8% contained more than one person”, indicates Vinci.
A more “bad” finding than last year, especially in the 7 a.m. – 8 a.m. time slot. Also at that time for home-to-work journeys, the rate of solo driving is 87% between 7:00 a.m. and 8:30 a.m. “then begins to decrease from 8:30 a.m. to reach 79% at 10:00 a.m.”.
Montpellier and Toulouse misclassified
Worse, of the 14 sites analyzed by Vinci, 11 show an increase, sometimes very accentuated, of this rate. As in Ile-de-France with + 9.1 points or in Toulouse with + 6 points.
If the A11 in Nantes monopolizes the top of the podium with a solo driving rate of 98.6%, the A64 in Toulouse (88%) and the A709 at Montpellier (87.8%) do not do honor to the Occitanie region, yet very invested in issues of soft mobility. To arrive at these results, Vinci analyzed more than one million vehicles between May and June 2022 using artificial intelligence technology.
“The main challenge revealed by this 2nd barometer remains the need to reduce autosolism when commuting to work. We are convinced that shared mobility can be used in commuting: it is up to all mobility players, operators, communities, the State, travel associations, to consult together and provide concrete solutions”, explains Amelia Rung, Development Director at Vinci Autoroutes.
The only positive point in this ranking, the decrease in the rate of autosolism on weekends. “On average, in Nantes, Bordeaux and Toulouse, on Saturday, 33% of drivers are accompanied, this figure rises to 39% on Sunday”, reports the study. In short, the longer the journey, the less the driver is alone.