ESTIMATING VALUES OF TIME: AN EXPERIMENTAL COMPARISON OF TRANSFER PRICE METHODS WITH THE REVEALED PREFERENCE APPROACH

Revealed preference methods of deducing values of travel time savings or losses depend upon relating observed choices to level of service characteristics of competing alternatives. There are, however, two main restrictions to this approach. Firstly, it is extremely difficult to identify experimental contexts in which travel time and money are the principal items being traded, and secondly quite large amounts of data are required to provide estimates with acceptable levels of statistical significance. Transfer price methods require each respondent to state the increase in theecost of a currently-preferred option which would just induce him/her to switch to another option. The relatively uninformative chosen/rejected dependent variable of revealed preference is replaced by the continuum of the reported transfer prices, thereby overcoming the limitations of the revealed preference approach. Thus, transfer price methods appear to offer an improved basis for evaluating travel time savings, though a question mark still remains over the reliability of the data elicited in response to transfer price questions. These issues are discussed, and conclusions are drawn in the light of a major modelling exercise in which a purpose-designed questionnaire incorporating transfer-price questions was administered. This has permitted a direct comparison between revealed preference and transfer price estimation of travel time values. This paper is presented in the form of an abstract. (TRRL)

• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/isbn/0860501124
• Supplemental Notes:
  • This paper was presented at Seminar N, Developing Countries, held at the PTRC Annual Summer Meeting, University of Sussex, England, 4-7 July, 1983.
• Corporate Authors:

  PTRC Education and Research Services Limited

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• Authors:
  • BROOM, D
  • LOWE, S
  • Gunn, H
  • Jones, S M
• Conference:
  • Planning & Transport Res & Comp, Sum Ann Mtg, Proc
• Publication Date: 1983

Media Info

• Pagination: p. 161

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Choice models; Conferences; Costs; Data collection; Decision making; Level of service; Present value; Prices; Questionnaires; Reliability; Savings; Simulation; Statistical analysis; Statistical significance; Transfers; Transportation modes; Travel; Travel time; Trip length
• Uncontrolled Terms: Selection; Value
• Old TRIS Terms: Transferring
• ITRD Terms: 8525: Conference; 224: Cost; 2248: Decision process; 9147: Interview; 698: Journey; 697: Journey time; 653: Level of service; 9072: Selection; 6532: Significance (stat); 9103: Simulation; 1145: Transport mode
• Subject Areas: Data and Information Technology; Finance; Highways; Operations and Traffic Management; Planning and Forecasting; I71: Traffic Theory; I72: Traffic and Transport Planning;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00382856
• Record Type: Publication
• Source Agency: Transport Research Laboratory
• ISBN: 0-86050-112-4
• Report/Paper Numbers: Volume P240
• Files: ITRD, TRIS
• Created Date: May 30 1984 12:00AM