How Travel Behavior is Reshaping American Infrastructure

Understanding where people travel, and why, is one of the most overlooked forces behind infrastructure planning. In this episode of Pave It Black, Auburn University transportation planning professor Jeff LaMondia shares how behavioral data informs where roadway investment and pavement rehabilitation happen.

Jeff breaks down how travel patterns have shifted since the pandemic, including the rise of remote work, flexible scheduling, e-commerce driven freight demand, and a growing trend of blending business and leisure travel. He also explains how transportation planners use this data to forecast congestion and prioritize where infrastructure dollars are spent.

The conversation then turns to resilience planning, where Jeff shares insights from his research on work zone impacts and an airfield pavement study examining how runways can withstand extreme weather and sea level rise. Together, these projects highlight how data driven planning and asphalt infrastructure work hand in hand to keep the country moving, now and for the next 250 years.

Here’s a sneak peek into this week’s conversation but be sure to tune in to the full episode for all the insights. You can listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BW: When you say travel behavior research, I’m curious how that really influences, or if it influences, infrastructure development.

JL: Definitely. I’d say I’m very biased here, but I think the transportation planning decision-making process is one of the most important things we have to do in making decisions about infrastructure.

We spend a lot of time collecting data and anticipating how people are going to move through our transportation network. Where we see congestion, where we anticipate issues as cities evolve and big destinations change, that’s where we’re going to put our money into expanding roadways, and into making sure those roadways are safe and long-lasting.

That’s where we’ll focus on rehabilitation of roadway pavement, things like that. Everything is based on predicting where people are going to go, whether it’s in our cities or on the interstate system between our cities.

This season is sponsored by FleetWatcher by AlignOps. Watch FleetWatcher in action.