Quality Indicator Set for Household Travel Surveys

High quality social-science surveys in general and surveys in travel behavior in particular are paramount for preparing decisionmaking processes, implementing integrative transport planning approaches, and for transportation modelling. Quantitative and qualitative indicators are necessary to determine the accuracy of the survey results. Based on an interdisciplinary overview of existing quality assessment approaches, this paper develops a Quality Indicator Set framework for systematically monitoring and assessing the quality of household travel surveys. 24 indicators are derived and classified along the three areas of Collection Quality, Content Quality, and Application Quality. For each indicator, the desired direction for improving quality and units for its measurement are given. No composite indicator is derived in order to keep the developed framework transparent, flexible and adaptable to each individual case study. The functionality of the developed Quality Indicator Set framework is demonstrated with the help of two exemplary applications. The provided Quality Indicator Set framework is applicable to traditional mixed-method household travel surveys but also to innovative approaches such as smartphone-based tracking of travel behavior and also to nontransport social science surveys. (C) 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.