The Cost of Equity: Assessing Transit Accessibility and Social Disparity Using Total Travel Cost

Social equity is increasingly incorporated as a long-term objective into urban transportation plans. Researchers used accessibility measures to assess equity, such as determining the amount of jobs reachable by marginalized groups within a defined travel time threshold and compare these measures across socioeconomic groups. However, allocating public transit resources in an equitable manner is not only related to travel time, but also related to the out-of-pocket cost of transit fares, which can represent a major barrier for many disadvantaged groups. Therefore, this research proposes a set of new accessibility measures that incorporates both travel time and transit fares. It then applies those measures to determine whether the level of transit accessibility of residents of socially disadvantaged neighborhoods in Montreal, Canada. Results are presented in terms of regional accessibility and trends by social indicator decile. Travel time accessibility measures estimate a greater number of jobs that can be reached compared to combined travel time and cost measures. However, the degree and impact of these measures vary across social deciles. Compared to other groups in the region, residents of socially disadvantaged areas have more equitable accessibility to jobs using transit; this is reflected in smaller decreases in accessibility when fare costs are included. Generating new measures of accessibility combining travel time and transit fares provides more accurate measures that can be easily communicated by transportation planners and engineers to policy makers and the public since they present measures in monetary values.

• Supplemental Notes:
  • This paper was sponsored by TRB committee ADD30 Standing Committee on Transportation and Land Development. Alternate title: The Cost of Equity: Assessing Accessibility by Transit and Social Disparity Using Total Travel Cost.
• Corporate Authors:

  Transportation Research Board

  500 Fifth Street, NW
  Washington, DC  United States  20001
• Authors:
  • El-Geneidy, Ahmed
  • Levinson, David
  • Diab, Ehab
  • Boisjoly, Geneviève
  • Verbich, David
  • Loong, Charis
• Conference:
  • Transportation Research Board 95th Annual Meeting
  • Location: Washington DC, United States
  • Date: 2016-1-10 to 2016-1-14
• Date: 2016

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Digital/other
• Features: Figures; References; Tables;
• Pagination: 35p
• Monograph Title: TRB 95th Annual Meeting Compendium of Papers

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Accessibility; Equity; Fares; Measures of effectiveness; Public transit; Travel time
• Geographic Terms: Montreal (Canada)
• Subject Areas: Public Transportation; Society;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01595077
• Record Type: Publication
• Report/Paper Numbers: 16-3715
• Files: TRIS, TRB, ATRI
• Created Date: Mar 31 2016 9:32AM