ICT and travel in the twin cities metropolitan area: enacted patterns between internet use and working and shopping Trips

The relationship between travel and telecommunications is now viewed as multifaceted: telecommunications can substitute for trips, telecommunications can modify trips, and telecommunications can stimulate trips. While this complexity is recognized, there is less empirical evidence on the exact manners by which these various interrelationships occur. And in particular, there is a paucity of data on how new forms of telecommunications— particularly high bandwidth—affects the patterns of behavior between telecommunications use and travel. This paper aims to further the discussion on the nature of information and communications technology (hereafter ICT), by focusing on work and shopping behavior at the household level. To do so, researchers examined the implications of home ICT access for residential travel behavior in and around Minneapolis, Minnesota. While targeted technologies included those that transmit voice and data (e.g. telephone and email), understanding how home Internet access via broadband, instead of slower dial-up connections, might influence repetitive trave