IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jotrge/v54y2016icp359-368.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Transit use and the work commute: Analyzing the role of last mile issues

Author

Listed:
  • Tilahun, Nebiyou
  • Thakuriah, Piyushimita (Vonu)
  • Li, Moyin
  • Keita, Yaye

Abstract

This paper examines the role that public transport last mile problems play in mode choice decisions of commuters, while controlling for trip, built environment, and decision maker related variables. Last-mile problems arise due to lack of adequate connectivity between transit stops and trip origin or termination points. The paper is motivated by previous literature which has pointed out that high-quality public transit needs to consider end-to-end connectivity from trip origins to destinations. In contrast to previous work on transit last mile problems, which has focused on physical distance and sidewalks to transit stops, we consider a wider range of area factors including transit availability, job accessibility, parking costs, the quality of the pedestrian environment and risks to pedestrians from vehicular traffic, and social characteristics such as street-level crime. Using a discrete choice model, our goal is to unpack ways in which such factors contribute to the last-mile problem in home-based work trips, while controlling for these wider range of factors as well as the usual variables such as cost and trip time that inform mode choice. We find that the prevalence of non-domestic violent crimes reduces the odds of using all types of non-motorized alternatives as well as transit that is accessed either by walking or driving. Using compensating variation to measure welfare changes, we show that there are significant benefits that could be brought to transit service users through increasing safety in the transit access trip. By separately controlling for origin and destination transit accessibility, we show that improved destination accessibility significantly boosts transit use to a greater degree than increases in origin level accessibility. These findings argue for improving accessibility and related job densities at employment centers.

Suggested Citation

  • Tilahun, Nebiyou & Thakuriah, Piyushimita (Vonu) & Li, Moyin & Keita, Yaye, 2016. "Transit use and the work commute: Analyzing the role of last mile issues," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 359-368.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jotrge:v:54:y:2016:i:c:p:359-368
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jtrangeo.2016.06.021
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0966692316303532
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jtrangeo.2016.06.021?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Reid Ewing & Robert Cervero, 2010. "Travel and the Built Environment," Journal of the American Planning Association, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 76(3), pages 265-294.
    2. Small, Kenneth A & Rosen, Harvey S, 1981. "Applied Welfare Economics with Discrete Choice Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 49(1), pages 105-130, January.
    3. Kim, Sungyop & Ulfarsson, Gudmundur F. & Todd Hennessy, J., 2007. "Analysis of light rail rider travel behavior: Impacts of individual, built environment, and crime characteristics on transit access," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 41(6), pages 511-522, July.
    4. Park, Sungjin, 2008. "Defining, Measuring, and Evaluating Path Walkability, and Testing Its Impacts on Transit Users’ Mode Choice and Walking Distance to the Station," University of California Transportation Center, Working Papers qt0ct7c30p, University of California Transportation Center.
    5. Lawrence Frank & Mark Bradley & Sarah Kavage & James Chapman & T. Lawton, 2008. "Urban form, travel time, and cost relationships with tour complexity and mode choice," Transportation, Springer, vol. 35(1), pages 37-54, January.
    6. Daniels, Rhonda & Mulley, Corinne, 2013. "Explaining walking distance to public transport: The dominance of public transport supply," The Journal of Transport and Land Use, Center for Transportation Studies, University of Minnesota, vol. 6(2), pages 5-20.
    7. Frans M. Dieleman & Martin Dijst & Guillaume Burghouwt, 2002. "Urban Form and Travel Behaviour: Micro-level Household Attributes and Residential Context," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 39(3), pages 507-527, March.
    8. Brons, Martijn & Givoni, Moshe & Rietveld, Piet, 2009. "Access to railway stations and its potential in increasing rail use," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 43(2), pages 136-149, February.
    9. Cervero, Robert & Round, Alfred & Goldman, Todd & Wu, Kang-Li, 1995. "Rail Access Modes and Catchment Areas for the BART System," University of California Transportation Center, Working Papers qt07k76097, University of California Transportation Center.
    10. Cervero, Robert & Radisch, Carolyn, 1996. "Travel choices in pedestrian versus automobile oriented neighborhoods," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 3(3), pages 127-141, July.
    11. Taylor, Brian D. & Fink, Camille N.Y., 2003. "The Factors Influencing Transit Ridership: A Review and Analysis of the Ridership Literature," University of California Transportation Center, Working Papers qt3xk9j8m2, University of California Transportation Center.
    12. Peiravian, Farideddin & Derrible, Sybil & Ijaz, Farukh, 2014. "Development and application of the Pedestrian Environment Index (PEI)," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 73-84.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Lowe, Kate & Barajas, Jesus & Coren, Chelsie, 2023. "“It's annoying, confusing, and it's irritating”: Lived expertise for epistemic justice and understanding inequitable accessibility," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 106(C).
    2. Losada-Rojas, Lisa Lorena & Gkartzonikas, Christos & Pyrialakou, V. Dimitra & Gkritza, Konstantina, 2019. "Exploring intercity passengers’ attitudes and loyalty to intercity passenger rail: Evidence from an on-board survey," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 71-83.
    3. Medina-Molina, Cayetano & Pérez-Macías, Noemí & Fernández-Fernádez, José Luis, 2023. "The use of micromobility in different contexts. An explanation through the multilevel perspective and QCA," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 188(C).
    4. Zhiwei Liu & Jianrong Liu, 2023. "Shared Autonomous Vehicles as Last-Mile Public Transport of Metro Trips," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(19), pages 1-15, October.
    5. Kevin Chan & Steven Farber, 2020. "Factors underlying the connections between active transportation and public transit at commuter rail in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area," Transportation, Springer, vol. 47(5), pages 2157-2178, October.
    6. Venter, Christoffel J., 2020. "Measuring the quality of the first/last mile connection to public transport," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    7. Rui Zhao & Linchuan Yang & Xinrong Liang & Yuanyuan Guo & Yi Lu & Yixuan Zhang & Xinyun Ren, 2019. "Last-Mile Travel Mode Choice: Data-Mining Hybrid with Multiple Attribute Decision Making," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(23), pages 1-15, November.
    8. Shiwakoti, Nirajan & Stasinopoulos, Peter & Vincec, Paul & Qian, Weidong & Hafsar, Renan, 2019. "Exploring how perceptive differences impact the current public transport usage and support for future public transport extension and usage: A case study of Melbourne's tramline extension," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 12-23.
    9. Lu, Ying & Prato, Carlo G. & Sipe, Neil & Kimpton, Anthony & Corcoran, Jonathan, 2022. "The role of household modality style in first and last mile travel mode choice," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 158(C), pages 95-109.
    10. Lu, Ying & Prato, Carlo G. & Corcoran, Jonathan, 2021. "Disentangling the behavioural side of the first and last mile problem: the role of modality style and the built environment," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    11. Cook, Simon, 2021. "Geographies of run-commuting in the UK," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 92(C).
    12. Shixiong Jiang & Wei Guan & Liu Yang & Wenyi Zhang, 2020. "Feeder Bus Accessibility Modeling and Evaluation," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(21), pages 1-17, October.
    13. Lu Cheng & Zhifu Mi & D’Maris Coffman & Jing Meng & Dining Liu & Dongfeng Chang, 2022. "The Role of Bike Sharing in Promoting Transport Resilience," Networks and Spatial Economics, Springer, vol. 22(3), pages 567-585, September.
    14. Xinwei Ma & Shuai Zhang & Yuchuan Jin & Minqing Zhu & Yufei Yuan, 2021. "Identification of Metro-Bikeshare Transfer Trip Chains by Matching Docked Bikeshare and Metro Smartcards," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(1), pages 1-19, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Li, Jingjing & Kim, Changjoo & Sang, Sunhee, 2018. "Exploring impacts of land use characteristics in residential neighborhood and activity space on non-work travel behaviors," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 141-147.
    2. Vale, David S. & Viana, Cláudia M. & Pereira, Mauro, 2018. "The extended node-place model at the local scale: Evaluating the integration of land use and transport for Lisbon's subway network," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 282-293.
    3. Wang, Jueyu & Cao, Xinyu, 2017. "Exploring built environment correlates of walking distance of transit egress in the Twin Cities," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 132-138.
    4. Parmar, Janak & Saiyed, Gulnazbanu & Dave, Sanjaykumar, 2023. "Analysis of taste heterogeneity in commuters’ travel decisions using joint parking– and mode–choice model: A case from urban India," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 170(C).
    5. Dong Wei & Xiaoshu Cao & Miaomiao Wang, 2019. "What Determines the Psychological Well-Being during Commute in Xi’an: The Role of Built Environment, Travel Attitude, and Travel Characteristics," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(5), pages 1-21, March.
    6. Janak Parmar & Gulnazbanu Saiyed & Sanjaykumar Dave, 2021. "Analysis of taste heterogeneity in commuters travel decisions using joint parking and mode choice model: A case from urban India," Papers 2109.01045, arXiv.org, revised Oct 2023.
    7. Ding, Yu & Lu, Huapu, 2016. "Activity participation as a mediating variable to analyze the effect of land use on travel behavior: A structural equation modeling approach," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 23-28.
    8. Toşa, Cristian & Sato, Hitomi & Morikawa, Takayuki & Miwa, Tomio, 2018. "Commuting behavior in emerging urban areas: Findings of a revealed-preferences and stated-intentions survey in Cluj-Napoca, Romania," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 78-93.
    9. Jaroslav Burian & Lenka Zajíčková & Igor Ivan & Karel Macků, 2018. "Attitudes and Motivation to Use Public or Individual Transport: A Case Study of Two Middle-Sized Cities," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 7(6), pages 1-25, May.
    10. Thi Mai Chi Nguyen & Hironori Kato & Le Binh Phan, 2020. "Is Built Environment Associated with Travel Mode Choice in Developing Cities? Evidence from Hanoi," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(14), pages 1-16, July.
    11. Manout, Ouassim & Bonnel, Patrick & Bouzouina, Louafi, 2018. "Transit accessibility: A new definition of transit connectors," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 88-100.
    12. Nicolas, Jean-Pierre & Pelé, Nicolas, 2018. "Reprint of Measuring trends in household expenditures for daily mobility. The case in Lyon, France, between 1995 and 2015," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 65(C), pages 19-29.
    13. Lucas, Karen & Philips, Ian & Mulley, Corinne & Ma, Liang, 2018. "Is transport poverty socially or environmentally driven? Comparing the travel behaviours of two low-income populations living in central and peripheral locations in the same city," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 622-634.
    14. Ahlfeldt, Gabriel M. & Pietrostefani, Elisabetta, 2019. "The economic effects of density: A synthesis," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 93-107.
    15. Mulley, Corinne & Ho, Chinh & Ho, Loan & Hensher, David & Rose, John, 2018. "Will bus travellers walk further for a more frequent service? An international study using a stated preference approach," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 88-97.
    16. Zheng, Zuduo & Washington, Simon & Hyland, Paul & Sloan, Keith & Liu, Yulin, 2016. "Preference heterogeneity in mode choice based on a nationwide survey with a focus on urban rail," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 91(C), pages 178-194.
    17. Steven R Gehrke & Kelly J Clifton, 2019. "An activity-related land use mix construct and its connection to pedestrian travel," Environment and Planning B, , vol. 46(1), pages 9-26, January.
    18. Neatt, Kevin & Millward, Hugh & Spinney, Jamie, 2017. "Neighborhood walking densities: A multivariate analysis in Halifax, Canada," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 9-16.
    19. Wenjia Zhang, 2016. "Does compact land use trigger a rise in crime and a fall in ridership? A role for crime in the land use–travel connection," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 53(14), pages 3007-3026, November.
    20. Azad, Mojdeh & Abdelqader, Dua & Taboada, Luis M. & Cherry, Christopher R., 2021. "Walk-to-transit demand estimation methods applied at the parcel level to improve pedestrian infrastructure investment," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 92(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jotrge:v:54:y:2016:i:c:p:359-368. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/journal-of-transport-geography .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.