This paper measures a) whether the reverse commute – a commute where a worker travels from a home location in the city to a workplace location in the suburbs – is characterized by a uniquely disparate socioeconomic and demographic space between home and workplace, and b) what role greater fragmentation between municipalities in a region might play in this theoretically inequitable circumstance. We employ administrative origin–destination data from the metropolitan Philadelphia, PA area and contemporary dimension reduction methodologies to model the likelihood of an origin destination pair being classified as a reverse commute. Particular attention is given to interactions between socioeconomic and metropolitan fragmentation terms and non-linear specifications of predictor variables. Greater socioeconomic and demographic disparity between home and work geographies is found to uniquely predict the reverse commute. We also find that fragmentation at the metropolitan scale has a multidimensional impact in relation to this socio-economic difference. Together, our findings appear to signal that, while greater regional socioeconomic disparity does indeed correlate with the reverse commute, greater metropolitan fragmentation may not. This portrait highlights new areas for transport research around political fragmentation and makes the case for renewed, equity-oriented policy investment in the reverse commuting problem.

本文测量了 a) 反向通勤——工人从城市的家中到郊区的工作地点的通勤——是否以家庭和工作场所之间独特的社会经济和人口空间为特征，以及 b) 什么在这种理论上不公平的情况下，一个地区的城市之间可能会产生更大的分裂。我们采用宾夕法尼亚州费城大都市地区的行政起点-目的地数据和当代降维方法来模拟起点目的地对被归类为反向通勤的可能性。特别注意社会经济和大都市碎片化术语与预测变量的非线性规范之间的相互作用。发现家庭和工作地区之间更大的社会经济和人口差异可以独特地预测反向通勤。我们还发现大都市规模的碎片化对这种社会经济差异具有多维影响。总之，我们的研究结果似乎表明，虽然更大的区域社会经济差异确实与反向通勤相关，但更大的大都市碎片可能不会。这幅肖像突出了围绕政治分裂的交通研究的新领域，并为在反向通勤问题上进行新的、以公平为导向的政策投资提供了理由。我们的研究结果似乎表明，虽然更大的区域社会经济差异确实与反向通勤相关，但更大的大都市碎片可能不会。这幅肖像突出了围绕政治分裂的交通研究的新领域，并为在反向通勤问题上进行新的、以公平为导向的政策投资提供了理由。我们的研究结果似乎表明，虽然更大的区域社会经济差异确实与反向通勤有关，但更大的大都市碎片可能不会。这幅肖像突出了围绕政治分裂的交通研究的新领域，并为在反向通勤问题上进行新的、以公平为导向的政策投资提供了理由。