The future. (Photo by philliefan99)

So much for our livable, walkable future. According to a new report by scholars at George Mason University, cars will remain the dominant form of transportation in the D.C. area for at least another thirty years.

Our region is projected to enjoy strong population and economic growth in the coming decades. And as the area grows, the rate at which people rely on cars to get to work or elsewhere will remain about the same level it is today. In 2007, just under three-quarters of the Washington metropolitan area’s gross regional product was enabled by automobile traffic, the George Mason study found. By 2040, that rate is projected be 73.1 percent, a very slight change from current levels.

“We talk a lot about transit, there’s a lot of emphasis on transit, but the truth is by what we’re going to build and what the patterns are in terms of relationships to economic activity, we’re not going to change those trends very much at all,” Senior Fellow John McClain, who led the analysis, told WTOP.

Public transit use is expected to rise, but only by so much. Even assuming that Metrorail’s Silver Line and all other currently desired transportation projects are completed, the George Mason study projects that reliance on public transportation to get to work will hold around 15 percent. As for biking and walking, there’s a slight projected uptick for those means, from 9.1 percent in the base year of 2007 to 9.7 percent in 2040.

Bike use increases when all purposes for travel are figured in, rising to about 13 percent.

Still, for the foreseeable future, cars will continue to dominate. And eighty-percent of added trips between now and 2040 will be conducted via automobile.

The future just got a lot less multimodal.