10 Invest in a multimodal transportation system
Invest in a multimodal transportation system to attract and retain businesses and residents
This section focuses on investments and peer region comparisons and rankings – measures that are similar to those in other sections are here compared to peer regions.
10.1 Commute travel modes
Providing residents and businesses with safe and reliable multimodal travel options apart from driving is one way to improve quality of life. In this section, we use national travel survey data to compare the travel choices people make in other peer regions to those made in the Twin Cities. The transportation decisions people make are shaped by the system available to them. A higher or lower proportion of trips made by non-auto mode indicates whether a system is more or less supportive of multimodal travel.
The best dataset for tracking mode share trends over time* and *across peer regions is the American Community Survey (ACS), a program of the United States Census. Conducted annually, the ACS asks one person in each surveyed household (usually the adult who completes the survey) to describe how they usually got to work in the preceding week. This is the only transportation mode-related question in the ACS. Though it only applies to employed adults, and a unique subset of trips (commutes), the consistency of the ACS across space and time allows for unique comparisons.
In most of the major metropolitan areas in the United States, the number and/or share of commutes made by driving significantly declined from 2006 to 2019. In San Francisco, Seattle, and Boston, the share of commutes by auto have dropped by an average of 0.4% or more each year since 2006. Auto commute share in the Twin Cities region has not declined as dramatically, but has fallen from 87.8% in 2006 to 85.0% in 2019, or at an average rate of about 0.2% per year.
As auto commutes have declined, the share of workers reporting that they typically work from home has risen steadily across U.S. metro areas from 2006-2019. Note that these years are prior to the COVID-19 pandemic; future versions of the ACS will reveal new magnitudes of shifts in commute travel. At the time of this report, 2020 data at the MSA level were not available. National trends in walk, transit, and bicycle commute share have been less pronounced and uniform than for work-from-home.
In 2019, The Twin Cities ranked 13th for walking commutes, 12th for transit commutes, and 13th for working-from-home, which is near the middle of the pack of 25 most populous MSAs. The Twin Cities region performs somewhat better in bicycle commute share, ranking 7th greatest in share of commutes by bicycle.
To compare peer regions’ non-commute travel – which comprises roughly 75% to 80% of all trips made in the region – we rely on the National Household Travel Survey (NHTS). The NHTS asks respondents detailed questions about how, where, why, and with whom they travel throughout the day. Performed less often than the ACS, the NHTS was last conducted in 2017, with new data being collected as of this report (2022).
Because the ACS and NHTS differ in their methodology and survey questions, mode share numbers do not exactly match across the two surveys. For example, for the same survey year (2017), drive share for commutes was 85.7% in the ACS, compared to 83.1% in the NHTS; transit share for commutes was 4.8% in the ACS, compared to 6.4% in the NHTS. Additionally, the Twin Cities metro ranks a bit higher in terms of non-auto commute share (8 of 25) in the NHTS than in the ACS.
Nevertheless, the two surveys show similar broad trends and rankings across the 25 metro areas, and provide unique data on non-commute mode share across the United States. In general, people tend to use transit more for commutes than for other types of trips. This is true in the Twin Cities as well, but somewhat more than in other metro areas. As a result, the Twin Cities falls from 8th to 14th of 25 metros for non-auto mode share, for all trip types.
Examining non-commute trip types alone (social, recreational, shopping, other) pushes the Twin Cities further down in the rankings for non-auto share, from 13th to 16th, on par with Atlanta, Phoenix, Houston, and Miami. Here, only 2.5% of trips between home and non-work destinations are made by transit and only 1.6% by bicycle, compared to 6.4% commutes by transit and 4.9% commutes by bicycle .
10.1.1 Summary
The Twin Cities region consistently ranks near the middle of the top 25 peer regions for non-auto mode share, but the region is less competitive when examining non-commute travel that supports daily life: errands, shopping, social and recreational trips. Examining one type of trip only – commutes – we see a decline in auto mode share across most major metros from 2006-2019 that was mostly attributable to an increase in the share of workers who report working from home in that period. Pre-pandemic, the Twin Cities was tracking alongside most of its peers in a rise of work-from-home commutes. Whether that trend will be sustained in the post-COVID era is yet to be seen.
10.2 Aviation
Six peer airport systems were identified in previous Transportation System Performance Evaluations for comparison. Using the year 2000 as the baseline year, the evaluation identified peers where:
- only one major hub airport serves the metropolitan area,
- a low-cost airline service was present at some time at the major hub airport, and
- the airport ranks in the top 20 in terms of activity.
Based on these criteria, the following peer regions were selected:
- Atlanta, GA
- Charlotte, NC
- Denver, CO
- Detroit, MI
- Philadelphia, PA
- Pittsburgh, PA
Since the year 2000, activity levels at Pittsburgh International Airport have steadily declined with loss of the former U.S. Airways hub. Although Pittsburgh is no longer a large hub, it has been maintained as a peer airport for consistency across evaluation updates. All other cities continue to meet the screening criteria outlined above.
Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport ranks 5th in non-stop destinations among the peer major hub airports, offering non-stop flights to 218 destinations in 2022.
Airport activity levels are typically measured by total aircraft operations. An operation is either an arrival or departure, and therefore one arrival and one departure represent two operations.
| Airport | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Minneapolis -- St. Paul (MSP) | 406,913 | 406,073 | 244,877 | 303,884 | 303,850 |
| Airlake (LVN) | 32,986 | 29,835 | 31,314 | 36,259 | 38,268 |
| Anoka County -- Blaine (ANE) | 75,465 | 71,740 | 70,852 | 74,657 | 65,688 |
| Crystal (MIC) | 38,109 | 41,541 | 39,509 | 37,845 | 42,592 |
| Flying Cloud (FCM) | 88,762 | 104,405 | 124,382 | 131,593 | 122,281 |
| Lake Elmo (21D) | 31,693 | 31,208 | 29,799 | 32,645 | 32,189 |
| St. Paul Downtown (STP) | 40,116 | 40,934 | 30,188 | 39,196 | 41,118 |
| Total | 714,044 | 725,736 | 570,921 | 656,079 | 645,986 |
| Source: Metropolitan Airports Commission, Annual Reports, 2021 & 2022 |
The Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) tracks on-time performance for arrivals and departures at all commercial airports in the U.S.
Table 10.2 shows the percentage of flights that arrived on-time at MSP airport for each year from 2018 through 2022. Aircraft must be airborne en route to their scheduled destination to be considered delayed. Cancelled and diverted flights are not considered late in this measure. A flight is considered on-time when it arrives less than 15 minutes after its published arrival time. Factors that can cause a flight to be delayed may be related to mechanical problems, lack of crew, weather, or airfield capacity constraints. As shown, MSP has operated above the national average for each year listed.
| Airport | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Minneapolis -- St. Paul (MSP) | 84.5% | 83.4% | 87.9% | 87.5% | 81.9% |
| National Average | 79.7% | 79.2% | 84.6% | 81.2% | 76.6% |
| Source: Bureau of Transportation Statistics, On-Time Performance - Reporting Operating Carrier Flight Delays at a Glance |
BTS also tracks the percentage of flights that depart on time, defined as flights that depart within 15 minutes of their scheduled departure time. As shown in Table 10.3, MSP has also operated above the national average each year listed for this measure.
| Airport | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Minneapolis -- St. Paul (MSP) | 85.3% | 83.9% | 88.3% | 87.9% | 81.2% |
| National Average | 80.4% | 79.9% | 85.5% | 81.2% | 76.6% |
| Source: Bureau of Transportation Statistics, On-Time Performance - Reporting Operating Carrier Flight Delays at a Glance |
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) tracks average delay per aircraft per operation, measured in minutes of delay. The total amount of airport-attributable delay experienced by all scheduled flights in the database is divided by the total number of flights in the database for the same time period. The Metropolitan Airports Commission (MAC) reports this information in their Annual Report to the legislature, ranking MSP against other large hub airports in the U.S. As shown in Table 10.4, with 5.3 minutes of delay per operation, MSP performed better than 30 other major hub airports in the U.S. in 2022.
| Measure | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Average Delay per Aircraft Operation in Minutes | 6.2 | 5.7 | 4 | 4.4 | 5.3 |
| Rank Among Large Hub Airports | 16 | 20 | 28 | 39 | 31 |
| Source: Metropolitan Airports Commission, Annual Reports, 2019-2022 |
In support of the FAA’s Airport Improvement Program (AIP), the FAA maintains a database of revenue passenger boarding information in their Air Carrier Activity Information System (ACAIS). Passenger boardings at MSP declined in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic and began to rebound in 2021.
| Airport | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Minneapolis -- St. Paul (MSP) | 18,409,704 | 18,361,942 | 19,192,917 | 7,069,720 | 12,211,409 |
| Source: Federal Aviation Administration, Passenger Boarding (Enplanement) Data for U.S. Airports, 2017-2021 |
The FAA maintains a database of financial reports of commercial service airports, known as their Compliance Activity Tracking Systems (CATS). CATS financial information is standardized to allow for comparison across airports using the same methodology. CATS data may differ from MAC-reported data for MSP in some cases. One key financial metric contained within the database is Airline Cost per Enplaned Passenger (CPE), which is a measure of the average passenger airline payments per boarded passenger at a given airport. Table 10.6 shows FAA-reported CPE data for MSP along with the average CPE for large hub airports in the U.S. Airlines operating out of MSP pay a lower rate per boarded passenger compared to the large hub average.
| Airport | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| MSP | $6.13 | $6.74 | $6.96 | $13.28 | $9.84 |
| Large Hub Average | $12.16 | $12.55 | $12.63 | $18.68 | $19.66 |
| Source: Federal Aviation Administration, Certification Activity Tracking System, Form 127, line 16.5 |
Table 10.7 summarizes total annual aircraft operations for 2018 through 2022 for MSP and peer airports. During this period, aircraft operations at MSP and all peers except Charlotte declined. Operations sharply declined at MSP and all peer airports in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
| Airport | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | Percent Change (2018-2022) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Charlotte (CLT) | 603,403 | 640,098 | 442,571 | 588,855 | 615,734 | 2.0% |
| Denver (DEN) | 550,013 | 579,147 | 397,983 | 514,782 | 499,037 | -9.3% |
| Atlanta (ATL) | 895,502 | 904,301 | 548,016 | 707,661 | 724,145 | -19.1% |
| Pittsburgh (PIT) | 151,414 | 148,119 | 91,797 | 108,472 | 121,688 | -19.6% |
| Minneapolis -- St. Paul (MSP) | 406,913 | 406,073 | 244,877 | 303,884 | 310,235 | -23.8% |
| Detroit (DTW) | 379,657 | 390,321 | 220,123 | 268,884 | 284,141 | -25.2% |
| Philadelphia (PHL) | 393,681 | 396,909 | 238,574 | 286,909 | 284,606 | -27.7% |
| Source: Federal Aviation Administration, OPSNET, Airport Operations Standard Report, 2018-2022 |