Gourmet Coffee Stops Decrease Gas Mileage;Home Brewed Premium Coffee Reduce Traffic Congestion

A researcher has stirred up the commuter coffee mug with the suggestion that morning rush hour traffic is worsened by stops for daily morning gourmet coffee at Starbucks and other premium coffee houses. Nancy McGuckin, a travel behavior analyst, studied a report called "National Household Travel Survey" by the U.S. Department of Transportation as the basis for her provocative conclusions.

It has long been known that frequent starting and stopping during a commute drastically reduces fuel economy due to the need to rev up the car engine to accelerate to traffic speeds and then stop for traffic lights and accelerate once again. This is the reason why manufacturers estimaged "city" mileage is always significantly lower than the estimated "highway" mileage. In addition, if the engine is turned off and restarted, mileage is decreased significantly, because it is at startup of the car engine that the most fuel is wasted.