Dutch employees are returning to the office en masse. In July, 78% of employees went to the office, but then an average of only three days a week. Despite the urgent advice from the national government to work from home as much as possible, 74% of the Dutch expect to appear at the office in September, for an average of 3,5 days a week. This is shown by research (*) by the business mobility platform Toogethr and research agency Ruigrok NetPanel.
The increase in the number of days that employees go to the office is significant. The big question is: how will all those employees return to their work safely? Before the coronavirus outbreak, 60% of working Dutch people traveled to work by car and almost a third (31%) by bicycle. But in September more than a third (67%) expect to commute by car. A seventh of employees took the train (13%) and / or the metro, tram, bus (13%) to go to work for Corona, which will almost be halved in September (8% and 7% respectively).
Coronavirus
The freedom to leave when you want (54%) is most important in the choice of means of transport in September. In addition, it is indicated that the corona virus also has some influence. Three in ten (29%) do not want to take corona measures and a quarter (23%) do not want to run the risk of becoming infected while on the road. For men, the freedom to leave when they want (61% versus 47%) and no hassle with finding a parking space (18% versus 7%) is more important than for women.
Remarkably, the motoring commuter does not expect any additional - or as many - parking problems as before. Three in five (62%) employees who traveled by car for corona and expect to do so in September, expect as many parking problems as before the corona outbreak. A quarter expects even fewer parking problems.
Joost Bijlsma, founder and CEO of business mobility platform Toogethr: 'If everyone goes back to the office in large numbers and takes a car en masse, it can sometimes become unexpectedly busy if no measures are taken to spread the arrival of staff. The national government is therefore calling on employers to spread working hours as much as possible. If this is not done adequately in September, the extra motorists on the road will undoubtedly cause problems in terms of accessibility, additional burden on the road network with possible increased congestion and adverse effects on the environment due to increased emissions'.
* About the research
The survey was conducted between 5 and 18 August by Ruigrok NetPanel, on behalf of Toogethr. The target group for this study consists of working Dutch people aged 25 and older and the sample is representative by gender, age, education level, company size and sector. Representativeness was obtained by weighting the results afterwards. NetPanel, Ruigrok NetPanel's online consumer panel, was used as a sampling frame. In total, n = 538 respondents aged 25 and older completed the online questionnaire.
Photo right: Depositphotos.
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