Policy Analysis for New Commuter Rail and Road Pricing Alternatives Using an SP Survey in Abidjan

In Abidjan, a road pricing scheme is currently under review as a transportation control measure along with operation of a new commuter rail system. While this scheme may be effective for congestion reduction in central business district (CBD), provision of alternative means of transportation for the "pushed-out" auto users is of great importance to obtain public acceptance. Hence, it is necessary to simulate simultaneously the road pricing scheme and the commuter rail development which may serve as an alternative for assumed pushed-out auto users. Utilizing data from the available opinion survey, this paper studies how commuter rail and auto ridership are likely to vary as a function of travelers and system attributes. Additionally, the study attempts to evaluate the way this new travel mode is distinguished from other existing conventional transportation alternatives in Abidjan. The survey data contains socioeconomic information of over 4,000 respondents as well as details of to-work/school or to-other trips to CBD including the mode, travel cost, time, etc. Respondents were then asked about their willingness to shift from their current mode to commuter rail to make the same travel for different commuter rail fare levels. Modeling efforts suggest that a mixed logit model performs better in explaining choice behavior. Therefore, this model was used for policy simulation. The simulation results brought about many implications as to the tested policies. While the developed model may be applied only to future commuter rail corridors in which the survey was conducted, it captures the key variables that are significant to explain mode choice behavior and presents great potential for practical use in policy simulation and analysis in a large metropolitan area of the developing world. (C) 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.