Exploratory analysis on worker's independent and joint travel patterns during weekdays and weekends

Abstract

Understanding the intra-household interaction elements such as independent and joint activity participation and travel, over multiple days are very less explored, especially in the context of developing countries like India. This paper discusses the results of a study on the independent and joint travel of working people, during weekdays and weekends. Four types of daily activity-travel patterns are examined, such as Simple-Independent, Simple-Joint, Complex-Independent and Complex-Joint. Multinomial logit modelling is adopted to model the type of activity-travel pattern as a function of socio-demographic attributes and day of week variables. Models were developed for whole-week, weekdays and weekends separately. The data used for this study is collected using questionnaire drop off and pickup method, from Calicut city, Kerala State, India. Analyses presented here are based on a sample of 936 working people. The results indicate that males are more likely to perform Complex-Independent type of travel pattern, compared to females. The influence of age, gender, marital status, education level and exclusive vehicle availability are similar during weekdays and weekends. The presence of elderly persons, young children and students at home are observed to be significant in influencing the choice of activity-pattern types during weekdays, whereas during weekends, these variables did not emerge as significant ones. On Sunday, the possibility for joint travel is significantly higher than other days of the week. Studies in this line are expected to assist transportation planners in formulating day of week specific policy strategies.