Route Choice Behaviour of Freeway Travellers Under Real-time Traffic Information Provision – Application of the Best Route and the Habitual Route Choice Mechanisms

Abstract

This paper investigates route choice behaviour on freeways between Taipei and Taichung in Taiwan under the provision of real-time traffic information. Two types of route choice selection rules (the best-route and habitual-route) are analysed using ordered probit models to identify the major influences on freeway travellers’ route choice behaviour. The level of service associated with each route is defined as a generalised cost saving (GCS) and specified non-linearly with a threshold inherent to travellers. The marginal (dis)utility thresholds in the ‘best’ and ‘habitual’ behaviour models are identified through a goodness-of-fit grid. The results confirm that the thresholds for changing the inertia behaviour of drivers should be larger than the ones for choosing the best routes. In addition, the drivers are more likely to choose either the best or the habitual routes once the GCS are greater than the identified threshold values.