The average road trip is 1300 miles.
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(Relaxnews) – According to research from Bridgestone Tires and from Harris Poll, almost nine in 10 US adults will be taking a road trip in excess of 50 miles over the summer and 71% are planning on traveling much further.
That’s because the average US road trip, whether it be to visit friends, arrive at a specific destination or is in itself the vacation, is some 1,300 miles.
And the idea of being stuck in a car, potentially in a traffic jam for hours on end is most appealing to the Millennial generation. In other words those that only a few years previously were sitting in the back of a vehicle asking their parents “are we there, yet?” every ten minutes.
Yet, more than three quarters (79%) of young adults said that they are planning at least one road trip this summer compared with 64% of Generation X respondents and 68% of Baby Boomers.
But whatever the age of the respondent, those with children at home were the most likely of all polled to be taking to the road – 82% compared with 66% of respondents without dependent kids.
As for the idea that vacationing by car is a way of saving money, Bridgestone found that of the 2000 adults it surveyed, those that said they were hitting the road also aim to save up as much as $1000 per person before the trip starts. When asked, respondents ranked the car as their preferred mode of transport (75%) followed by flying (31%), while only 7% like the idea of vacationing via the train. The company also found that 18% of Americans will be heading out on their annual road trip during Independence Day weekend.
Yet with 1300 miles to cover, entertainment and reliving the boredom is high on US holidaymakers’ agendas and many are looking at the latest digital advances. When asked by Harris Poll, 55% of respondents said that an in-car wi-fi hotspot would make a journey more enjoyable and 40% said that having connectivity between their smartphones and the car’s infotainment system would make the journey safer.
Driving is the most dangerous form of transport and road accidents the leading cause of accidental death in the US, and when asked about the latest generation of active safety features it’s perhaps unsurprising that consumers see them as a vital element of safer driving. For example, 86% said they’d feel safer on a journey if their car had a blind sport monitoring system and 84% felt the same about a lane departure warning system.
Likewise, 77% of respondents felt that adaptive cruise control, which can maintain a safe distance between the vehicles in front and behind even if they reduce speed, would make them feel more secure and 73% said that a built-in navigation system would make them feel “more safe” when on a road trip.