Compared with just before the COVID-19 pandemic, people are spending nearly an hour less a day doing activities outside the home, behavior that researchers say is a lasting consequence of the pandemic.

A new study by Brian D. Taylor and Sam Speroni of the UCLA Institute of Transportation Studies (ITS) and Eric A. Morris of Clemson University reveals an overall drop since 2019 of about 51 minutes a day in time spent on out-of-home activities and an almost 12-minute reduction in time spent on daily travel such as driving or taking public transportation.

Published today in the Journal of the American Planning Association, the study found that this shift toward “going nowhere fast” promises to affect people and society on many levels, from psychology to sociology to economics.

The authors call for a rethinking of many planning and transportation policies. Their recommendations include repurposing office and retail real estate given the increase in working and shopping from home. Restrictions on converting commercial buildings to housing should also be relaxed and curb space for delivery vehicles increased given the rise in online shopping, they argue.

The researchers assessed the years before, during and after the pandemic, namely 2019, 2021, 2022 and 2023. The year 2020 was excluded in part because data gathering was halted at the height of the outbreak. The study examined the work and leisure habits of 34,000 Americans ages 17 and over using data from the American Time Use Survey, conducted by the United States Census Bureau and sponsored by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The authors all have ties to UCLA Luskin Urban Planning: Taylor, professor and former director of ITS, earned his PhD in 1992; Morris earned his master’s in 2004 and PhD in 2011; Speroni earned his master’s in 2020 and is currently a doctoral student.

Read the full story