Darren SCOTT, McMaster University, Canada
Matthias SWEET, Ryerson University, Canada
The public health measures imposed by many jurisdictions around the world in response to the COVID-19 pandemic shifted many people’s work from their offices to their homes. Telework, for the first time, was imposed en masse rather than negotiated between employer and employee, not as a means to reduce commuting, but as a means to diminish the spread of a highly-communicable disease. While telework has long been considered an important travel demand management strategy, there is now emerging evidence that its widespread uptake has unintended consequences such as shuttered physical businesses and an exodus of households from congested cities to their surrounding suburbs and exurbs. This study offers insights into how telework might impact cities in the future by modeling the trajectory of telework in Canada across three time periods: pre-pandemic, pandemic, and post-pandemic. The sample of individuals used in this study are drawn from an online survey, administered in Fall 2021, of approximately 5000 Canadians residing in six Census Metropolitan Areas. The results of this study show who is least and most likely to be teleworkers in the near future, providing guidance with respect to the potential future longevity of telework habits and their broader implications.
Mots clés : Canada|COVID-19|Telecommuting|Telework|Travel Demand Management
A102371DS