Evaluating transportation alternatives during the COVID-19 outbreak

Juan Francisco Saldarriaga, Senior Data and Design Researcher at the Brown Institute for Media Innovation

We are analyzing how, in the first few weeks of the COVID-19 outbreak in New York City, the choice of transportation mode and their total usage changed. Specifically, we are looking at a significant decrease in subway usage - not uniformly distributed - and an initial increase in Citibike usage. However, as the lockdown went into place and the crisis progressed both transportation modes saw significant decreases in usage. We will also look at taxi usage and compare it with the previous two.