On the factors affecting the choice of regional transit for commuting in Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area: Application of an advanced RP-SP choice model

This paper presents a jointly estimated Revealed Preference Stated Preference (RP-SP) choice model to explore mode choice behavior of commuters in a multimodal regional transportation system in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA). The paper focuses on the commuting trips that are long enough to be served by more than one transit services (local and regional transit services) in the GTHA (hence denoted by cross-regional commuting). This type of trips represents a unique travel market for which multimodal transportation services compete with each other. The study uses a dataset collected by a purposely designed SP pivoted on RP choices of cross-regional commuters in the GTHA. An advanced RP-SP model structure is specified to enhance parameter estimation from the SP choices by explicitly capturing the correlations between the SP choices and corresponding elicited confidence ratings. The econometric model also accounts for serial correlations between SP choices of the same respondents as well as inertia effects between RP and SP choices. The estimated choice model is used to predict the effectiveness of different strategies on commuting mode choice behaviour of cross-regional commuters. The results of the empirical investigation revealed many behavioural details such as the effect of eliminating co-fare between local and regional transit services and providing Wi-Fi on regional transit vehicles on increasing the share of regional transit modes. It is found that monetizing park and ride at transit stations will deter some individuals from using transit, however, this strategy can be considered as a way to manage the increasing parking demand at regional transit stations and to improve the access time of park and ride users.