COMFORT AND CONVENIENCE IN TRAVEL DEMAND MODELS: SOME RECENT ADVANCES

A psychological approach to the quantification of qualitative attributes is described. The basis of the method is to use quantitative comparisons made by subjects about stimuli to develop scales that describe the amounts of the qualities possessed by the stimuli. Two principal subgroups of the approach are available: a unidimensional sealing based upon an initial restrictive assumption that the attribute to be measured exists in a one-dimensional space and can be described along a linear continum; and multidimensional sealing which may be used to define the dimensionality (in a Euclidean space) of the attribute. Three research tasks are identified: testing of the sealing concept in a transportation situation; fitting of the resulting scale values or indices into a travel demand model in order to determine whether there is a relationship between revealed behavior and preceived attribute ratings of alternative travel modes; the mapping of the psychological scale values onto engineering specifications and testing the resulting proxy variables in a revealed behavior nexus. The results are reported of testing the first 2 tasks and their application to the formulation of a convenience index and a comfort index.

• Supplemental Notes:
  • This paper appears in "Urban Traffic Models", which is a publication containing the Proceedings of Seminar N of the Summer Annual Meeting at University of Warwick, England during July, 1975.
• Corporate Authors:

  Planning and Transport Res and Computation Co Ltd

  167 Oxford Street
  London W1R 1AH,   England 
• Authors:
  • Stopher, P R
• Publication Date: 1975-7

Media Info

• Features: Figures; References; Tables;
• Pagination: p. 263-272
• Serial:
  • Publication of: IRCOBI SECRETARIAT
  • Publisher: IRCOBI (International Research Council on the Biokinetics of Impacts)

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Comfort; Mathematical models; Psychological aspects; Public transit; Quality control; Quantitative analysis; Travel demand
• Uncontrolled Terms: Models; Quality; Quantifying
• Subject Areas: Highways; Operations and Traffic Management; Public Transportation; Society;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00148102
• Record Type: Publication
• Report/Paper Numbers: P122
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Feb 23 1981 12:00AM