Comparing immigrant commute travel adaptation across and within racial/ethnic groups

Authors

Lingqian Hu
Nicholas J. Klein
Michael J. Smart

Document Type

Journal Article

Publication Date

2021

Subject Area

place - north america, place - urban, planning - surveys, policy - sustainable, ridership - behaviour, ridership - commuting

Keywords

Transit, Walking/biking, National household travel survey, Acculturation, Segmented assimilation

Abstract

This research investigates differences in the adaptation process of immigrant commute distance and commute mode across and within three racial/ethnic groups—white, Hispanic, and Asian—in the United States to explore policies that facilitate immigrant travel in an efficient and sustainable way. A two-step analysis is conducted: the first step uses all US-born as the reference group, and the second step uses US-born of the same race/ethnicity as the reference. The second step overcomes a potential problem in existing research on immigrant travel adaptation: When all US-born are used as the reference group, the statistics mainly reflect the travel behavior of US-born white people, masking intrinsic travel differences among US-born racial/ethnic groups. Based on multi-level regression analysis of the 2017 National Household Travel Survey (NHTS) data, our results support existing findings of initial difference but eventual convergence of immigrant commute behavior with US-born, while highlighting white immigrants' persistence and Hispanic immigrants' low propensity in using non-automobile modes. Comparison results based on the two reference groups suggest that segmented assimilation due to racial/ethnic group membership is limited. Still, nuanced findings denote distinctive spatial mechanisms that affect immigrant and US-born Asians and highlight the short time window after immigrants' arrival in the U.S. during which policies might contribute to a continuation of their sustainable travel patterns.

Rights

Permission to publish the abstract has been given by Elsevier, copyright remains with them.

Comments

Transport Policy Home Page:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/0967070X

Recommended Citation

Hu, L., Klein, N.J., & Smart, M.J. (2021). Comparing immigrant commute travel adaptation across and within racial/ethnic groups. Transport Policy, Vol. 110, pp. 112-122.