Abstract:Both as a business response to internal business problems, and as a transportation demand management (TDM) strategy, telecommuting is gaining acceptance in the United States and elsewhere. Yet there is no consensus on what actually does and does not constitute telecommuting. This paper first indicates why approaching such a consensus is important. It then discusses the definition of telecommuting in two different contexts. In the first case, telecommuting is considered in the abstract, in the context of a variety of other remote work options. Each of the remote work options is classified according to its transportation impacts and its managerial implications. In the second case, the efforts of one group to define non-home-based telecommuting in the specific context of an air quality regulation designed to reduce travel are documented.

Note:Refer to RP-91-35 (PubID 989), published in Transportation Research Record 1305, for a condensed version of this work.