Three days each week, at the tail end of the morning rush hour, Jonathan Ball drives from Pasadena to his job in Camarillo -- a journey of 57 to 64 miles, depending on his route.
Over the last few months, he has seen his speed often increase and his time on the road lessen, convincing him that traffic may be easing its grip on parts of Southern California.
"It was one of those days I took the 210 to the 118," Ball said. "Instead of taking an hour and 15 minutes to get to work, it took an hour and 10 minutes. It was only five minutes, but I noticed it because I wasn't even pushing it that day."
If there has been anything that remains quintessentially unpredictable over the years in the Southland, it's traffic. One day it's good, the following it's let's-move-to-Portland awful, then it's back to tolerable.
But a sampling of residents, traffic reporters and technical data indicates that as gasoline prices have climbed and the economy has faltered, weekday congestion has softened in some areas over the last month. There are notable decreases in commuting times on some well-traveled freeways.
Other drivers say their commutes are still bad, but that the roads are more lightly traveled at midday and evenings -- the times of day that people make discretionary trips.
The Freeway Performance Measurement System, a computer database overseen by UC Berkeley and Caltrans, provides several examples.
The morning commute from Simi Valley to Los Angeles averaged 61 minutes in April 2007 when gas cost a little more than $3 a gallon but fell to 55.1 minutes last month. Also significant are numbers from the Inland Empire, where the morning drive from Riverside to Ontario fell nearly 13% -- from 41.5 minutes in April 2007 to 36.2 minutes this April.
Also down in early May was the number of incidents reported to the California Highway Patrol in Los Angeles County -- the belly of the traffic beast. Accidents and breakdowns are thought to cause about 50% of all congestion.
In most cases, the difference in commuting times is small and typically ranges from one to five minutes.
But there is evidence of fewer cars on the road. In Orange County, Caltrans officials said that road sensors had shown a slight drop in the average number of vehicles each day on freeways such as the 91 and 405 and that toll road business was down about 6%.
