Do passengers feel convenient when they transfer at the transportation hub?

Abstract

Passengers’ perceptions play an important role in the evaluation of transfer efficiency for a transportation hub. However, there are many ways to transfer between hubs and urban traffic, and passengers who use different transfer modes may have different perceptions of the same hub. This paper adopts a case study of the Nanjing South Comprehensive Transport Hub in China to identify the main barriers to intermodal integration from a people-centered perspective. A total of 833 questionnaires were collected to reflect passengers' perceptions of interchange services. Combined with observational investigations, we mainly consider factors such as the comfort of the transfer process, the frequency of departures, the route to the ticket office, and the location of the entrances to different urban transportation modes. A Rasch model is established based on the perceptions of inconvenience in passenger transfers. The model comprehensively evaluates intermodal transport services between the hub and urban traffic from the perspective of passengers. According to the results, there are significant differences for different interchange modes, and the factors that cause these differences are heterogenous. In addition, the results show that transfer facilities for metro and cars urgently need improvement due to their greater ridership. Finally, recommendations are given to planners and policy makers by considering the transfer demands of different passenger groups.