Developing a combined residential location and transport mode choice model using RP and SP data

Abstract

Bangladesh is a densely populated developing country with a population of more than 140 millions in an area of only 56,931 square mile (BBS, 2011). Most of the development activities of the country are centralized in a few major cities of Bangladesh leading to mass migration to these cities everyday for better facilities in job, business, education, health care, recreation, etc. As a result, it is observed that people have a tendency to live in the capital and other major cities and commute long distance to their workplaces. Further, it is also a common practice to maintain split families where one earning member of the family (generally the male member) lives near workplace while the other family members live in the capital Dhaka or other major cities with the children. All these lead to increase in Vehicle Mile Travel (VMT) and increased use of motorized transports. This research has been conducted to explore the factors affecting the choice of residential location and transport modes and to identify the key factors that lead people to live away from their workplace. A combined discrete choice model framework for residential location and model choice has been developed in this regard. The framework has been demonstrated for the relevant choices of the faculty members of two universities, Shahjalal University of Science and Technology (SUST) and Dhaka University of Engineering and Technology (DUET). The data used for the model estimation has been collected from a Stated Preference (SP) survey on residential location and mode choice of respondents. In the survey, the respondents have been presented with hypothetical situations with improved oncampus residential facilities and modified transport options. For improved oncampus residential facilities, different levels of school and college facilities, university house rents, opportunity of spouse jobs and few addition facilities have been presented as attributes. In case of mode choice for DUET faculty members, BRT and improved train service have been presented alongside current modes. In case of mode choice for SUST faculty members, levels of service of SUST bus in terms of travel time, travel cost and frequency have been varied. In each scenario, the respondents have been asked to state their choice of residential location and transport modes. Model estimation results indicate that for SUST, house rent and availability of school and college facilities, headway of SUST bus, travel cost and socio-economic variables (age, gender, marital status) control the combined choices of residential locations and travel modes. For DUET, school college facilities, house rent, travel time, frequency and comfort of travel mode has been found to be highly significant but socio economic variables are not very significant. The developed models provide useful insights and can help in policy formulation that can lead to increase in proportion of people living nearer to workplace and/or use public transport and thus lead to reduction of travel demand. The combined model framework proposed in this research can be used as extended to other contexts in future.