MWCOG created these graphics showing the origins of commuting trips to various employment areas. Not surprisingly, people generally cluster nearer to their jobs, and around major transportation facilities.

People who work in Tysons or Reston/Herndon are the most spread out, while people who work in downtown DC concentrate in smaller areas. The patterns of workers in the Pentagon and Rosslyn-Ballston corridor fall somewhere in the middle.

A Metro presentation lists the biggest areas of transportation need for each employment area. For downtown DC, the needs lie along 16th Street, Wisconsin and Upper Connecticut Avenues, and Shirley Highway, and in Capitol Hill and Central Anacostia. Arlington workers need transit on Columbia Pike, Shirley Highway, Burke/West Springfield, Route 1 South, and North Arlington/McLean.

For Tysons and western Fairfax, the biggest gaps include Reston/Herndon, Chantilly/Centreville, Shirley Highway again (for Tysons), Falls Church and Vienna (for Tysons), and Cascades/Ashburn (for Reston/Herndon). Bethesda and NIH workers, meanwhile, most need transportation from Germantown, Silver Spring, and Wheaton. As always, these needs match current living patterns, but any transportation investment we make in any of these particular areas will also foster even more growth in, and trips to and from, those areas.

Residential location of workers employed in the federal portion of the DC CBD. The map for the commercial portion of the CBD is nearly identical.

Residential location of workers employed in Tysons Corner.

Residential location of workers employed in Pentagon/Crystal City.

Residential location of workers employed in Rosslyn/Ballston.

Residential location of workers employed in Reston/Herndon.

Residential location of workers employed in Bethesda/NIH.

David Alpert created Greater Greater Washington in 2008 and was its executive director until 2020. He formerly worked in tech and has lived in the Boston, San Francisco Bay, and New York metro areas in addition to Washington, DC. He lives with his wife and two children in Dupont Circle.