Households without Vehicle

Transportation is important not only for accessing healthcare, but also for employment, food and other basic necessities. People without a vehicle are dependent on others or public transportation, which can create a barrier to getting where they need to be when they need to be there.

The ZIP-level analysis below shows that households in low socioeconomic areas are much more likely to not have a vehicle. Nearly 29 percent of households in urban SES1 ZIP codes do not have a vehicle. While the prevalence of vehicle-less households is lower in suburban and rural areas, the impact for those households can be larger since distances between homes, services and employment are generally further.

Methodology note: The SES index ranking was developed by Common Ground Health and calculated using a variety of socioeconomic indicators from the American Community Survey including average income, poverty rates, education levels, housing value, and homeownership. Each ZIP code is assigned a socioeconomic (SES) index ranking from 1 to 5. The lower SES ZIP codes tend to have lower average income, higher poverty rates, lower prevalence of college degrees, etc.