Overall Rating Gold - expired
Overall Score 65.98
Liaison Audrey McSain
Submission Date Feb. 26, 2021

STARS v2.2

Lehigh University
OP-16: Commute Modal Split

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 3.87 / 5.00 Robert Bruneio
Manager, Transportation Services
Transportation Services
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Total full-time equivalent student enrollment:
6,633

Full-time equivalent of employees:
1,801

Part 1. Student commute modal split

Has the institution gathered data about student commuting behavior?:
Yes

Total percentage of students that use more sustainable commuting options as their primary mode of transportation:
93

A brief description of the method(s) used to gather data about student commuting:
A sustainability survey was distributed by the Office of Sustainability in the Spring of 2018 in which students were asked to anonymously respond to the following question: What is your primary mode of transportation to campus? The answers from which they could choose were the OP-16 answers listed above. This survey was approved by the IRB and can prove statistically valid.

We also met with the Parking Services to ascertain the number of permits on campus and bus ridership to estimate the number of students driving vs. taking the bus vs. walking. This greatly improved our estimates from last year because the number of students with cars is much lower, and therefore could not be the estimated percentage we had previously.

By including the Lehigh bus system, we estimated about 30% of students use that to get to class. This lowered the walking/biking category a bit.

We also used data from student parking passes to estimate which students are driving and which are carpooling. Those with commuter passes were counted as busing because they park in the commuter lot and have to bus to campus.

Part 2. Employee commute modal split

Has the institution gathered data about employee commuting behavior?:
Yes

Total percentage of employees that use more sustainable commuting options as their primary mode of transportation:
20

A brief description of the method(s) used to gather data about employee commuting:
The bus percentage for faculty increased. After talking with Parking services, we went through and looked at the percentage of faculty and staff that had a parking pass, and estimated from those that do not who would bus. She said this has gone up with the new LANTA free rides with Lehigh ID. We also included Lehigh faculty and staff that are not on this campus (New York and California) and assumed higher bus rates there, thus raising the overall bussing percentage. I also used a survey of distance from campus for faculty to estimate some data.

Besides this, walking/biking rates also went up and personal driving and carpooling percentage went down. Again, this data was found using parking pass information with Sara. Specific passes for carpooling members and parking pass information were both used for this.

Besides this, walking/biking rates also went up and personal driving and carpooling percentage went down. Again, this data was found using parking pass information with Sara. Specific passes for carpooling members and parking pass information were both used for this.

Optional Fields 

Percentage of students and employees that use the following as their primary mode of transportation:
Percentage of students (0-100) Percentage of employees (0-100)
Single-occupancy vehicle 7 80
Zero-emissions vehicle --- ---
Walk, cycle, or other non-motorized mode 49.58 12
Vanpool or carpool 13.96 1.50
Public transport or campus shuttle 29.46 6
Motorcycle, motorized scooter/bike, or moped --- ---
Distance education / telecommute --- ---

Website URL where information about student or employee commuting is available:
---

Additional documentation to support the submission:
Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
Commute modal split was impacted by COVID-19 and the resulting institution shutdown. Data from last STARS submission was used with updated numbers of students and employees to be representative of a normal year.

Note: For our next submission, we plan to do a new, more-comprehensive commuting survey to gather data.

The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.