THE TECHNICAL EFFICIENCY OF CANADIAN URBAN TRANSIT SYSTEMS

Authors

A K. Boame

Document Type

Journal Article

Publication Date

2004

Subject Area

place - urban, mode - mass transit

Keywords

Urban transit, Transit, Resource allocation, Regression analysis, Regression, Public transit, Mass transit, Local transit, Economic efficiency, Data analysis, Confidence intervals, Canada, Bias (Statistics)

Abstract

This study seeks to improve resource utilization in transit systems by identifying the sources of efficiency change in the Canadian urban transit sector. A bootstrap data envelopment analysis (DEA) method is used to estimate technical efficiency scores for Canadian urban transit systems from 1990 to 1998. Bias and confidence intervals are estimated for the efficiency scores. A Tobit regression is used to analyze the sources of efficiency change. The paper finds that the original efficiency scores are biased. The bootstrap results indicate that the average technical efficiency of the transit systems is about 78%. Most transit systems experience increasing returns to scale. While higher average transit speed increases efficiency, peaking decreases efficiency, which reinforces previous DEA efficiency studies. The methodology presented here can help inform transit managers on how to allocate scarce resources to achieve efficiency in transit service provision.

Comments

Transportation Research Part E Home Page: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/13665545

Recommended Citation

Boame, A, (2004). THE TECHNICAL EFFICIENCY OF CANADIAN URBAN TRANSIT SYSTEMS. Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Volume 40, Issue 5, p. 401-416.