The demand for public transport. part II. supply and demand factors of public transport

Abstract

This two‐part article, concerned with the way public transport ridership is affected by the various relevant factors, is based on the Executive Summary of The Demand for Public Transport (Webster and Bly 1980), the report of the TRRL‐sponsored International Collaborative Study on Factors Affecting Public Transport Patronage. Part I of the article, which was concerned with the social and economic conditions in which public transport operates, showed the importance of the background factors such as income, car ownership and land use on public transport usage: it also indicated how the longer‐term impacts of the more direct demand factors (fares, service levels) often show themselves in changes in car ownership levels, activity patterns (i.e. where people live, work, shop, socialize, etc) and land‐use development.

Part II reviews the current state of knowledge on the effects of changes in fare levels and quality of service and of the introduction of various traffic and transport measures (traffic restraint, bus priority, etc): it outlines current methodology on costing public transport services and draws the supply and demand sides together in a consideration of particular strategies which are at the disposal of the operator, the planner and the policy maker.     

Understanding engagement and disengagement from pro-environmental behaviour: The role of neutralization and affirmation techniques in maintaining persistence in and desistance from car use

Despite mounting evidence that car use is a prime culprit of global warming, our love affair with the car persists. General awareness of the environmental consequences of car usage is high but fails to correspond to moderated car use. This paper contributes to an understanding of how university students’ environmental beliefs affect decisions to engage in continued car use (persistence) and/or to discontinue or reduce car use (desistance). The aim of the research presented here was to explore the range of neutralizations and counter-neutralizations (affirmations) employed by students and to examine the ways in which they are used to justify and maintain either persistence or desistance in car use. The research consisted of six focus group sessions with thirty-four UK-based Higher Education students. Analysis of the study’s data highlights the range of neutralizations and counter-neutralizations employed by students in social settings. The article discusses the usefulness of neutralization theory in accounting for actual and/or intended non-environmentally friendly behaviour such as car use. In addition, the study’s findings are discussed in relation to prior research and to potential implications for public policy interventions which favour moderating car usage.     

Effect of environmental awareness on electric bicycle users’ mode choices

Travellers’ environmental awareness can affect their mode choices. The primary objective of this study is to identify the effect of electric bicycle (e-bike) users’ environmental awareness on their mode choice when the use of e-bikes is prohibited in urban areas in China. The data were collected via a questionnaire survey administered at ten locations in Nanjing, China. Using mixed multinomial logit (MMNL) models, we examined the relationship between the e-bike users’ mode choice and their environmental awareness, combined with socioeconomic and demographic characteristics and trip attributes. The results show that the level of environmental awareness, gender, age, education, income, the ownership of car and conventional bike, and trip distance affect e-bike users’ choices significantly. Those with a high level of environmental awareness are more likely to choose zero-emission transport modes. A stratified analysis reveals that the effect of environmental awareness is associated with their original transport mode choice prior to their use of the e-bike. With a high level of environmental awareness, original car users tend to opt for moderate- or zero-emission modes; original bus and metro users incline to choose a zero-emission mode or their original mode; and few original cyclists and walkers favour moderate- or high-emission modes. The results of the current study provide transport authorities with insights to establish sustainable urban transportation management policies and strategies to increase the share of zero- and low-emission transport modes.     

Exploring the role of social capital influence variables on travel behaviour

This paper explores the potential role of individual trip characteristics and social capital network variables in the choice of transport mode. A sample of around 100 individuals living or working in one suburb of Madrid (i.e. Las Rosas district of Madrid) participated in a smartphone short panel survey, entering travel data for an entire working week. A Mixed Logit model was estimated with this data to analyze shifts to metro as a consequence of the opening of two new stations in the area. Apart from classical explanatory variables, such as travel time and cost, gender, license and car ownership, the model incorporated two “social capital network” variables: participation in voluntary activities and receiving help for various tasks (i.e. child care, housekeeping, etc.). Both variables improved the capacity of the model to explain transport mode shifts. Further, our results confirm that the shift towards metro was higher in the case of people “helped” and lower for those participating in some voluntary activities.     

Electrification of the two-car household: PHEV or BEV?

In previous works, we have shown two-car households to be better suited than one-car households for leveraging the potential benefits of the battery electric vehicle (BEV), both when the BEV simply replaces the second car and when it is used optimally in combination with a conventional car to overcome the BEV’s range limitation and increase its utilization. Based on a set of GPS-measured car movement data from 64 two-car households in Sweden, we here assess the potential electric driving of a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV) in a two-car household and compare the resulting economic viability and potential fuel substitution to that of a BEV.Using estimates of near-term mass production costs, our results suggest that, for Swedish two-car households, the PHEV in general should have a higher total cost of ownership than the BEV, provided the use of the BEV is optimized. However, the PHEV will increasingly be favored if, for example, drivers cannot or do not want to optimize usage. In addition, the PHEV and the BEV are not perfect substitutes. The PHEV may be favored if drivers require that the vehicle be able to satisfy all driving needs (i.e., if drivers don’t accept the range and charge-time restrictions of the BEV) or if drivers requires an even larger battery in the BEV to counter range anxiety.We find that, given a particular usage strategy, the electric drive fraction (EDF) of the vehicle fleet is less dependent on whether PHEVs or BEVs are used to replace one of the conventional cars in two-car households. Instead, the EDF depends more on the usage strategy, i.e., on whether the PHEV/BEV is used to replace the conventional car with the higher annual mileage (“the first car”), the less used car (“the second car”), or is used flexibly to substitute for either in order to optimize use. For example, from a fuel replacement perspective it is often better to replace the first car with a PHEV than to replace the second with a BEV.     

Car today,gone tomorrow: The ephemeral car in low-income,immigrant and minority families

Most transportation research in the United States uses cross-sectional, “snapshot” data to understand levels of car access. Might this cross-sectional approach mask considerable variation over time and within households? We use a panel dataset, the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID), for the years 1999–2011 to test this question. We find that for most families, being “carless” is a temporary condition. While 13 % of families in the US are carless in any given year, only 5 % of families are carless for all seven waves of data we examine in the PSID. We also find that poor families, immigrants, and people of color (particularly, blacks) are considerably more likely to transition into and out car ownership frequently and are less likely to have a car in any survey year than are non-poor families, the US-born, and whites.     

Does transport help people to gain employment? A systematic review and meta-analysis of the empirical evidence

ABSTRACT

The role of transport in providing access to employment has received considerable attention. Since transport policies may be motivated by assumed effects on employment probability outcomes, it is important to establish the nature of the relationship between transport and employment outcomes. While the majority of the empirical evidence suggests a positive association, it is not conclusive or consistent and often shows mixed results. To address this confusion, our study has systematically reviewed this evidence base and synthesised it through meta-analysis. We first identified 93 studies that quantitatively assessed the impact of transport on employment outcomes. By systematically merging the empirical evidence, this study establishes a positive association between transport and employment outcomes, with varying effects for four identified categories of transport measures (or combinations thereof): car ownership, public transport access, commute times, and job accessibility levels. This positive association persists in studies that control for endogeneity between transport and employment, but a larger evidence base is needed to establish a more robust relationship, in particular for cities and smaller (rural) areas outside the US-context and with regard to public transport. We then selected 20 methodologically comparable studies for inclusion in the meta-analysis. Our meta-regression models clearly demonstrate that car ownership significantly increases individual employment probabilities, in particular among welfare recipients. Young drivers benefit from access to household cars when these are not in use by their parents, and they are more sensitive to the time and cost implications of longer commutes. While our systematic review suggests that better access to public transport and higher levels of job accessibility increases employment probabilities, meta-regression analysis requires more consistent transport measures. The findings in this study are important for policymakers in that they imply that job seekers may benefit from public policies targeted at improving their access to public transport, in particular for people without access to cars and in areas with fewer job opportunities.     

Car ownership and public transport use: Revisiting the interaction

At the beginning of the 1980s, it seemed that a consensus was emerging among researchers that public transport service levels, fares or quality had a small but possibly important effect on car ownership, and that this should be taken into account for those purposes where car ownership forecasts are used for developing policy on public transport or roads. Somehow, the findings faded away, and had little effect on policy thinking or on analytical techniques. The results of six surveys carried out in South Yorkshire over the period 1972 to 1991, during which there were extreme changes in public transport policy, tend to support a prima facie case for reopening the question. At the household level, car ownership rates are shown to be more volatile than is often assumed, especially in multiple car households. This volatility provides a context within which the quality of public transport provision appears to influence both the level of car ownership and the relationship between changes in the level of car ownership and changes in public transport use.     

Car ownership,travel and land use: a comparison of the US and Great Britain

This paper conducts an international comparative analysis of relationships between car ownership, daily travel and urban form. Using travel diary data for the US and Great Britain, we estimate models of car ownership and daily travel distance. Both a structural model with daily travel conditional upon car ownership and a reduced form model for daily travel, excluding car ownership, are estimated. Model results are similar, and show that differences in travel are explained by (1) differences in demographics between the two countries; (2) lower household income in Great Britain; (3) country specific differences in costs of car ownership and use, transport supply and other factors we have not been able to control. We find that metropolitan size affects travel only in the largest metropolitan areas of the US. Daily travel distance is inversely related to local population density, but the effect is much stronger for the US than Great Britain. We conclude that higher transport costs in Great Britain promote economizing behavior, which in turns leads to more consumption of local goods and services and more use of alternative transport modes.     

Factors affecting car ownership and mode choice in rail transit-supported suburbs of a large Chinese city

As Chinese cities continue to grow rapidly and their newly developed suburbs continue to accommodate most of the enormous population increase, rail transit is seen as the key to counter automobile dependence. This paper examines the effects of rail transit-supported urban expansion using travel survey data collected from residents in four Shanghai suburban neighborhoods, including three located near metro stations. Estimated binary logit model of car ownership and nested logit model of commuting mode choice reveal that: (1) proximity to metro stations has a significant positive association with the choice of rail transit as primary commuting mode, but its association with car ownership is insignificant; (2) income, job status, and transportation subsidy are all positively associated with the probabilities of owning car and driving it to work; (3) higher population density in work location relates positively to the likelihood of commuting by the metro, but does not show a significant relationship with car ownership; (4) longer commuting distance is strongly associated with higher probabilities of riding the metro, rather than driving, to work; (5) considerations of money, time, comfort, and safety appear to exert measurable influences on car ownership and mode choice in the expected directions, and the intention to ride the metro for commuting is reflected in its actual use as primary mode for journey to work. These results strongly suggest that rail transit-supported urban expansion can produce important positive outcomes, and that this strategic approach can be effectively facilitated by transportation policies and land use plans, as well as complemented by timely provision of high quality rail transit service to suburban residents.     

Urban transport in Germany: providing feasible alternatives to the car

With the second highest level of car ownership in the world, and the third highest population density in Europe, Germany has adopted a range of policies to balance the many private benefits of car use with its serious social and environmental problems. In order to ‘tame’ the car, most German cities have implemented a twofold strategy of expanding and improving pedestrian, bicycling and public transport alternatives simultaneously with restricting car use and making it more expensive. That has increased political acceptability since the car‐restrictive measures are not perceived as mere punishment of car drivers. The results of this coordinated urban transport strategy have been impressive. Germany, as a whole, has managed to increase public transport use and to stabilize the car share of modal split. Some cities, of course, have been more successful than others, and this paper examines three of the most successful cities: Münster, Freiburg and Munich. In each of the cities, the percentage of travel by bicycling, walking and public transport has been raised over the past 20 years, while the car's share of modal split has fallen. This article documents the range of policies used to restrict car use, both in Germany as a whole, and in the three case‐study cities in particular. The key to success is found to be mutually reinforcing transport and land‐use policies. It is the combination of a whole set of coordinated policies that explains the dramatic success in changing travel behavior.     

Could you also have made this trip by another mode? An investigation of perceived travel possibilities of car and train travellers on the main travel corridors to the city of Amsterdam,The Netherlands

We investigated perceived travel possibilities (or subjective choice-sets, consideration-sets) of car and train travellers on the main corridors to the city of Amsterdam, The Netherlands, and associations with traveller and trip characteristics. We conducted secondary analysis on a survey sample consisting of 7950 train and 19,232 car travellers. Forty-five percent of train travellers had a car in their objective choice-set, 27% of them would however never use it for this trip. Trip destination city centre, trip purpose, paying for the trip, public transport commitment, traffic congestion and parking problems were associated with consideration of car as alternative. Forty-two percent of car travellers had public transport in their subjective choice-set. The ratio between perceived public transport and objective car travel time stood out as determinant of consideration-sets, next to destination city centre, trip purpose, travel time and private versus company car ownership. On average, car travellers’ perceptions of public transport travel time exceeded objective values by 46%. We estimated that if perceptions would be more accurate, two out of three car travellers that currently do not see public transport as an alternative would include it in their choice-set, and use it from time to time. This effect has strong theoretical and policy implications.     

Assessment of an eastern European city's public transport system

The paper examines the present quality of public transport services in Budapest and compares that to the impact of growing car ownership. A review is made of the city's transport plans and future investment proposals and these are assessed in light of public transport's present and likely future competitive position compared to private cars. The paper concludes that much of the proposed investment in a metro system will not maintain public transport's competitive position in the face of rising car ownership and that other measures and investments might be more effective.     

Patterns of car usage and restraint modelling

Transport demand forecasting procedures have traditionally employed household based modal split models implicitly assuming a selection of mode for each trip based on relative generalised cost. A detailed examination of the trip patterns of a sample of household in West Yorkshire shows that in fact there is little discretionary choice of public transport; public transport trips in car owning households generally being explained in terms of the specific unavailability of the car for such trips. Two versions of a category analysis model for modal split are based on this observation and applied to household data for Glamorgan and Monmouthshire to show that such a procedure is workable and produces results comparing favourably with traditional approaches. The likely implications of three types of restraint policy are examined and it is concluded that the existing interdependence in trip patterns and modal choice within the household is of great significance in determining their effects. In particular it appears that positive attempts to increase vehicle occupancy at the peak are likely to be more favourable to public transport finances than the more negative policies to restrain use of the car for journey to work, or second car ownership.     

How does environmental concern influence mode choice habits? A mediation analysis

Starting from the intuition that people with high environmental concern have a better perception of public transport and therefore a better perception of the utility of public transport, we construct a theoretical model in which the effect of environmental concern on mode choice habits is mediated by the indirect utility of travel. Travel procures the direct utility of providing access to activities, but it also offers an indirect utility that is inherently personal and perceptual. We approach the indirect utility of public transport by measuring perceptions of time and feelings. The indirect utility of the car is approached by measuring affective and symbolic motives. Taking into account car use habits and habits of public transport use, the results show that people who have a high environmental concern perceive public transport use as easier, more useful and more pleasurable than people who do not have that environmental motivation. Such positive attitudes foster public transport use. Conversely, low environmental concern generates non-instrumental motives for car use, such as affective and symbolic motives. However, the relationship between affective and symbolic motives and car use habits is not robust. We can conclude that environmental concern influences mode choice habits and that the effect is partially mediated by perceptions and feelings towards public transport but not significantly by affective and symbolic motives for car use.     

The acceptability of road pricing in Vienna: the preference patterns of car drivers

The acceptability of road pricing has attracted considerable attention among researchers over the last decade, as is evident in the amount of literature about transport and environmental economics. The general conclusion from these studies has been that there is low acceptability for road pricing among car users. In this paper, we add more knowledge to the existing literature by conducting an acceptability study of road pricing in Vienna, where such a study has never been conducted before. We used a replication study approach where a previous approach used in the EU research project AFFORD (acceptability of fiscal and financial measures and organisational requirements for demand management) was replicated for Vienna and further supplemented with a conjoint analysis. In order to examining whether the Vienna study confirms previous findings. We investigated the acceptability of two concrete policy packages factors influencing this acceptability, and preference patterns that can be used in designing a road pricing policy for Vienna. The survey reveals a higher acceptability if road pricing schemes lead to perceived personal benefits. According to the multivariate analyses, the “personal outcome expectations”, “social norm” and “perceived effectiveness” variables account for more than 50 % of the criterion variance and therefore these are the most influential factors. Road pricing schemes can be an effective transport management instrument for a city particularly if they are associated with direct investment in public transport and public infrastructure. Thus, personal benefits can be perceived more easily and direct effects can be expected.     

A model to assess public transport demand stability

Transport authorities, especially those in developing countries where rising income stimulate increased car ownership rates, are often concerned with maintaining or increasing levels of public transport use. Therefore, the ability to identify clients at risk of abandoning the system can be valuable for remedial measures, allowing for more focused quality improvements. We present and apply a model that determines the probability of migrating from public to private transport at both aggregated and disaggregated levels. In application, the model predicted migration with 60% accuracy in the first preference recovery measure. The proposed model can improve the understanding of the behavior of public transport users, the analysis of demand stability and the factors influencing migration. This, in turn, can help to focus policy and management measures and increase the efficiency of public investment.     

Understanding adolescents’ intentions to commute by car or bicycle as adults

This study focuses on the intentions of adolescents to commute by car or bicycle as adults. The behavioral model is based on intrapersonal and interpersonal constructs from the theory of planned behavior extended to include constructs from the institutional, community and policy domains. Data from a survey among Danish adolescents is analyzed. It is found that car use intentions are related to positive car passenger experience, general interest in cars, and car ownership norms, and are negatively related to willingness to accept car restrictions and perceived lack of behavioral control. Cycling intentions are related to positive cycling experience, willingness to accept car restrictions, negative attitudes towards cars, and bicycle-oriented future vision, and are negatively related to car ownership norms. Attitudinal constructs are related to individual characteristics, such as gender, residential location, current mode choice to daily activities, and parental travel patterns.     

National policy towards cars: the federal republic of Germany

Although much of the early technical development of the automobile occurred in Germany, the spread of car ownership within Germany was relatively slow up to 1933. Besides the general economic situation, this was due to the high costs of purchasing and running a car. With deliberate promotion of automobility by the national‐socialists after 1933, the pace of motorization proceeded more rapidly until the outbreak of World War II. Immediately after the war, motorization was slow to regain momentum but by the middle fifties, after the initial phase of post‐war reconstruction, the rapid build‐up of cars began again and has continued ever since. By 1986, the West German car fleet exceeded 27 million and 80% of motorized passenger kilometres were made by car.

This rapid post‐war growth was made possible by a liberal transport policy which reacted to growing car use by adaptation and provision of the necessary infrastructure. The adverse effects of vehicular traffic on the environment and on the urban quality of life moved policy at the end of the sixties towards stronger support for urban public transport and regulations for noise and exhaust emissions of automobiles. Also, the high toll of death and injuries from road accidents made improvement of road safety another important policy objective. So far, however, measures taken have fallen short of requiring changes in driver behaviour. Although there is widespread awareness of the environmental and accident costs of automobility, there is a reluctance to legislate (or for people voluntarily) to modify driving behaviour for social objectives.

This paper presents, briefly, the main instruments that have been applied in West Germany to achieve car‐related transport policy objectives, including the latest modifications in the tax system intended to foster the use of low‐emission vehicles. Possible future directions of policy towards the car, depending inter alia on changes in government, are also explored.