Investigating the Moderating Effects of Built Environment and Socio-demographics on Vehicle Ownership Using Latent Class Modeling

Vehicle ownership (VO) is of vital interest to transportation planning and policy, both in its own right and as a correlate of other travel-related behaviors. This study explores disaggregate relationships among socio-economic/demographic (SED) traits, the built environment (BE), and VO. Many previous studies have assumed that the importance of SED and BE variables is homogeneous across the population, and have focused on the direct and mediated effects of those variables on VO. Here, the authors aim to account for heterogeneity in the effects of BE and SED, allowing those effects on VO to be moderated as a function of attitudes. Specifically, the authors use Latent Class Modeling (LCM), which probabilistically segments the sample so as to be homogeneous within and heterogeneous across segments, with respect to the choice process. Applied to a sample of 2385 commuters in Northern California, LCM outperforms an ordinary multinomial logit model and a deterministic segmentation model, and produces meaningful results. The authors find that household size and income have stronger influences on owning more vehicles for the “auto-oriented” segment than for the “urbanite” segment. On the other hand, in general, urbanites are found to be more affected by the BE than auto-oriented individuals are. This study contributes to better understanding the heterogeneity of an important travel-related choice process, offering another approach to addressing residential self-selection.

• Supplemental Notes:
  • This paper was sponsored by TRB committee ADD30 Standing Committee on Transportation and Land Development. Alternate title: Investigating the Moderating Effects of Built Environment and Sociodemographics on Vehicle Ownership Using Latent Class Modeling
• Authors:
  • Kim, Sung Hoo
  • Mokhtarian, Patricia L
• Conference:
  • Transportation Research Board 97th Annual Meeting
  • Location: Washington DC, United States
  • Date: 2018-1-7 to 2018-1-11
• Date: 2018

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Digital/other
• Features: References; Tables;
• Pagination: 6p

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Automobile ownership; Built environment; Commuters; Demographics; Households; Income; Multinomial logits; Socioeconomic factors
• Uncontrolled Terms: Latent class models
• Geographic Terms: Northern California
• Subject Areas: Highways; Planning and Forecasting; Society;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01659507
• Record Type: Publication
• Report/Paper Numbers: 18-00682
• Files: TRIS, TRB, ATRI
• Created Date: Feb 7 2018 1:41PM