De Gustibus Disputandum Est: Non-Linearity in Public Transportation Service Quality Evaluation

Document Type

Journal Article

Publication Date

2013

Subject Area

ridership - behaviour, ridership - perceptions, ridership - drivers, mode - bus, operations - reliability

Keywords

discrete choice, multinominal logit, public transportation, random parameter logit, service quality, user perceptions

Abstract

User perceptions of service quality are essential to promote public transport ridership and trigger positive externalities. Therefore, research efforts need to analyze service quality from the point of view of users. This paper builds on the stream of works studying perceptions of public transport service quality but shifts the focus towards user heterogeneity. Using a discrete choice experiment this paper attempts to disentangle different dimensions of decision heterogeneity for bus services. Among the main findings the paper discusses the implications of different types of decision heterogeneity, such as non-linear preferences, and relates this to the formulation of bus service contracts.

Rights

Permission to publish the abstract has been given by Taylor&Francis, copyright remains with them.

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