Sustainable Travel Research Articles

Multi-scale moderation impacts of jobs and housing balancing on sustainable commuting behavior in Seoul

Balancing jobs and housing (JH) can induce sustainable travel behavior, reducing dependence on private cars for commuting. Many studies have explored the possibility of either the multi-scale of place or the multi-level of people for examining the impact of JH balancing on sustainable commuting behavior. However, limited studies have focused on both the impact of the combined probability of mode choice and time to commute in a private car. Therefore, this study empirically identified the impact of JH balancing in spatial multi-scales such as neighborhoods, districts, and metropolitan cities on the combined probability of mode choice and the time taken to commute in a private car. Overall, 23,956 workers from Seoul, South Korea, were examined by applying hierarchical Tobit models. The study also demonstrated the moderating impact of JH balancing on sustainable commuting behavior based on income, education, occupation, and number of workers per household. The results confirmed that although sustainable commuting behavior decreased as the spatial scale of JH balancing increased, the effect of spatial scale was not consistent. Specifically, its effect on sustainable commuting was the greatest at the neighborhood level, although there was no distinct difference at the district and metropolitan city levels. This study also confirmed differentiation in the multi-scale impacts of JH balancing by income, education, job, and number of workers per household. Finally, the study concludes that more sustainable commuting behavior can be induced through steady investments in public transit at the metropolitan city scale, along with a supply of affordable housing near employment centers and affordable jobs near residential areas at the neighborhood level, while considering the differences at various levels of demographic and socioeconomic attributes for workers.

Seasoned travelers are more sustainable: modelling the tourism experience life cycle

ABSTRACT Mapping a tourist’s travel frequency and behaviour over time (as outlined in the Tourism Experience Life Cycle (TELC)), may be as important as Butler’s Tourism Area Life Cycle (TALC) as there is a ‘need to understand the life cycle for a tourist’ (Dodds, 2020, p. 219). This paper, using a quantitative approach of 980 Canadians, tests the validity of the TELC model to determine if sustainable travel behaviours increase the more a tourist travels. Two hypothesis are tested in this paper. First, the more trips taken by a traveller, the more sustainable their behaviur will be and second, the more a traveller revisits the same destination, the more sustainable their travel behaviour will be. Findings, supported through ANOVA and hierarchical multi-step regression, show that there is a relationship between the number of trips taken and sustainable behaviour. The greater the number of domestic and/or international trips that a leisure traveller takes, the more likely their behaviour while travelling will be more sustainable. On the other hand, findings also outline that the more frequently a visitor returns to the same destination, the less likely they will practice sustainable travel behaviour.

Impacts of the Feeder-Related Built Environment on Taxi-Metro Integrated Use in Lanzhou, China

It is very common that taxi is used as a feeder mode to/from a metro station especially in third-tier cities of China. But research on taxi-metro integrated use is rather limited. This paper investigates the relationship between feeder-related built environment and taxi-metro integrated use by using taxi trajectory data in Lanzhou, China. Firstly, regression models are developed to explore the transfer distance of access/egress trips during peak hours. Then, the catchment area is delineated for collecting feeder-related environment variables. Finally, several negative binomial regressions are employed to examine the relationships between feeder-related built environment and taxi-metro integrated use during peak hours on weekdays. The results reveal that (a) people prefer to use taxi as feeder mode for metro access during morning peak hours and for metro egress during evening peak hours; (b) the transfer distance of taxi-metro integrated use is about 3.8 km; (c) higher mixed land use generates more taxi-metro integrated use during evening peak hours. Higher proportion of residential land use attracts more taxi-metro integrated use for metro access during morning peak hours. Those findings will help transport planners to develop tailored land-use interventions to improve transit accessibility and promote the sustainable multimodal travel.

‘Telling tales’: Communicating UK energy research through fairy tale characters

Storytelling is gaining traction in the field of energy and social science research. It supports collective agenda setting, embraces complexity, and represents one way to tackle the ‘wicked problems’ of climate change. It is particularly important given the commonly opaque nature of social science outputs, and the urgency in which responses to climate change are now required. Responding to these challenges and recognising the value of storytelling, we present three ‘telling tales’ in this paper. Each takes inspiration from a well-known fairy tale character (i.e., mermaids, vampires, and witches) to translate energy and social science research in the empirical contexts of electricity generation, sustainable travel, and plastic pollution in the UK. We draw on these fairy tale characters as a part of arguing that UK policy reflects a fixation with renewables, excessive caution concerning car ownership and use, and a reductive approach to plastics. In response, we consider some alternative approaches, each aimed at delivering transformational adaptation, premised on demand reduction. We aim, more broadly, to inspire others to tell their own convincing tales to communicate research findings beyond academic circles and to help bring about change.

Environmental Sustainability and Territorial Competitiveness: A Comparison between Italian Provinces

The emergence of globalisation and the removal of obstacles between markets have heightened rivalry between territorial areas. To have a competitive advantage, the regions have to be unique. As one of the tactics used to boost their reputation on a territorial level, territories are progressively adopting environmental policies for sustainable and shared prosperity. Indeed, effective management of urban growth depends heavily on sustainable development. In this regard, the literature occasionally refers to the “green branding” of cities, a strategy that makes use of environmental aspects to boost the allure of metropolitan environments. There is currently little consensus in the literature on the measuring of environmental performance, and no statistical study has been done to confirm the efficacy of these measures in terms of territorial competitiveness. Therefore, it is important to determine whether there is a relationship between a territory’s level of sustainability and competitiveness in Italy. According to the statistical analysis of the Italian provinces, the Northeast, Northwest, Centre, and Islands are the four geographical regions with the highest average scores. This unquestionably indicates a basic comprehension and supports the notion that there is a relationship between the two variables. However, it also serves as a warning about how geographical disparities in Italy represent a major issue affecting the most diverse sectors. In addition, the COVID-19 pandemic problem has drastically altered consumer demands and goals, leading consumers to seek out more sustainable travel and cities that are designed with citizens’ requirements in mind. It will therefore become more and more important to research how public and private administrators, as well as policy makers, react to these changes.

Road space reallocation in Scotland: A health impact assessment

IntroductionRoad space reallocation involves re-distributing space away from motor vehicles, including car parking and carriageway space, towards other uses. This can promote a shift to more sustainable travel modes and is likely to affect health through multiple pathways. MethodsWe conducted a health impact assessment to identify and assess the potential impacts of road space reallocation on health and health inequalities in Scotland. This involved a facilitated scoping workshop to identify potential impacts, collation of routine data, interviews with 13 key informants and a rapid review of research literature. ResultsWe found that road space reallocation could have positive impacts on health by reducing overall levels of private motorised traffic, encouraging walking, wheeling and cycling, realising benefits from alternative uses of space and supporting local businesses. There is potential for positive impact on public transport if space is reallocated to prioritise buses, but bus users can also be disadvantaged if bus routes are diverted or stops impeded. Reallocation can improve transport and health equity if it increases support for modes other than car use, but disabled people may be disadvantaged if the reallocated space, and alternative modes, are not accessible for them. ConclusionsRoad space reallocation can improve health and help reduce health inequalities. However, consideration is needed to ensure sufficient alternatives to car use are supported and the reallocated space is accessible for people with different needs. Reallocation schemes should be considered as part of a wider inclusive approach to road transport supporting active travel and public or community transport. Road space reallocation should contribute to wider place-making initiatives aiming to improve quality of local environments and meet community needs.

확장된 계획행동이론을 적용한 지속가능 항공여행 소비행동 이해

In this study, we tried to explain the decision-making process of aircraft users more logically through an extended planning action theory that additionally introduced sustainable air travel consumption behavior by approaching the planning action theory. As a result of identifying the formation process of passengers" behavioral intention, it was found that subjective norms and sustainable air travel consumption behavior factors affect behavioral intention. In particular, sustainable air travel consumption behavior has the greatest influence on airline selection, which can be interpreted as the result that the trend of consumer awareness change is focused on high awareness of sustainability issues and environmental impact. Positive (+) results were also derived at the significance level for subjective norms, and the support and recommendation of people around them for the behavior of sustainable air travel was derived as an important factor.

Multimodality incentivized by employer-based travel demand management

ABSTRACT This study explored the effectiveness of various employer-based travel demand management strategies in promoting multimodality and mode substitution among employees in Washington state using a mixed multinomial logit model. The study found that employee transportation coordinators played an important role in encouraging the use of sustainable travel modes. Spatial analysis revealed that individuals who lived and worked in proximity were more likely to adopt multimodal transportation. The study also highlighted the convenience of driving alone and the lack of information on sustainable alternatives as two major barriers to the adoption of sustainable transportation modes and recommended educational campaigns to increase awareness. To inform practice, this study identified transit subsidies, parking pricing, and work schedule flexibility as the most effective TDM strategies to promote multimodality and mode substitution, followed by compressed workweeks, and providing easy access to transit and amenities.

Walking accessibility to non-work facilities and travel patterns in suburban new towns

Previous research on the self-containment of new towns has focused on access to employment and commute travel; little research has been documented regarding access to non-work facilities and its relation to non-work active travel, overlooking an important aspect to assessing the self-containment of new towns. Drawing on multiple sources of data in Hong Kong, we measure walking accessibility to three main types of non-work facilities (markets, restaurants and parks) as major destinations for non-work travel. Through a series of statistical analysis, we investigate in detail the effects of accessibility on the probability and duration of home-based walking trips. Our findings indicate that: (1) new towns were more disadvantaged and less equitable in terms of the accessibility to non-work facilities than urban areas; and (2) accessibility increased both the likelihood and duration of new town residents' walking trips particularly for grocery-shopping and dining-out purposes. The findings indicate that enhancing accessibility to non-work facilities in new towns can be beneficial in terms of both achieving self-containment and promoting more sustainable travel behaviour. Recommendations are proposed accordingly to help create more pedestrian-friendly environment, and balanced provision of non-work facilities in and around new towns and other suburban developments.

RUSSIAN TOURIST ETHICS IN BALI: LAW ENFORCEMENT ASPECTS TOWARD SUSTAINABLE TOURISM

With millions of foreign tourists traveling the globe each year, tourism is regarded as the largest and most significant industry in the world. Mainstream operators with a large volume of inexpensive and affordable vacations dominate tour operations market. A specialty operator sector coexists with the mainstream market and offers niche products to remain competitive. This study aims to determine whether specialized tour operators of Russian market in Bali view green and sustainable tourism as a niche market potential. Green and sustainable tourism has gained popularity over the past ten years. It will delve into the idea of green and sustainable tourism, look at how the Russian tourist market specialist view consumer demand for green and sustainable vacations’ products, and identify the crucial qualities for green and sustainable Bali tourism operators in terms of law enforcement as it is stipulated in Regional Law of No 2 of 2012 on Bali Cultural Tourism. Whether specialized tour operators of Russian market who promote green and sustainable tourism travel feel they may obtain a competitive advantage at a high cost will be determined.

Do Residents Living in Transit-Oriented Development Station Catchment Areas Travel More Sustainably? The Impacts of Life Events

Transit-oriented development (TOD) is an urban designed model aimed at attracting more sustainable travellers. However, not all TOD projects succeed in maintaining a high rate of sustainable travel behaviour. To examine the impacts of TOD on residents’ travel behaviour, this paper applies binary logistic regression to analyse survey data for 1,298 residents living in the TOD areas in Hangzhou collected in 2020. The results show that socioeconomic characteristics, built environment factors, and travel attitudes play important roles in influencing their travel mode choices. Furthermore, the number of children in households and higher levels of car ownership significantly influence residents’ sustainable travel behaviours. However, it appears that only a limited number of factors can convince car users to shift to sustainable modes of travel, such as their workplace being accessible by metro and attitudes towards changes in accessibility. This research study contributes to the existing literature in terms of enhancing the understanding of travel mode choice behaviours, particularly with regard to people who live near public transport infrastructure, as well as formulating evidence-based TOD policies to achieve more sustainable transport systems.

Who is more attached to their car? Comparing automobility engagement and response to shared, automated and electric mobility in Canada and Germany

The “automobility system” encompasses the prevalence of the privately-owned car in industrialized societies. We apply automobility theory in a novel approach, by investigating consumer engagement with aspects of the automobility system related to car ownership and use in the case studies of Canada and Germany, while also considering openness to new mobility innovations. These countries differ in that Canada has higher levels of car ownership, commutes made by car, and urban sprawl, as well as lower levels of carsharing and electric vehicle adoption relative to Germany. We apply a conceptual framework and 40-item scale of consumer “automobility engagement” to representative survey samples of 3527 Canadian and 2620 German respondents. Exploratory factor analysis identifies five automobility engagement factors: “Driving Enjoyment”, “Car Identity”, “Car Dependence”, “Societal Concern about Car Use”, and “Sustainable Travel Norms”. Mean scores are significantly higher for Canadian respondents on four factors, but not significantly different for “Driving Enjoyment”. In regression analysis, these factors can help to explain consumer interest in carsharing, fully automated vehicles, and electric vehicles in both countries, where “Car Dependence” and “Societal Concern about Car Use” predict interest in fully automated and electric vehicles. Interactions reveal that some patterns differ by country; for example, “Societal Concern about Car Use” predicts carsharing interest among German respondents only. The similarities and differences in country results suggest that the framework can be useful in a variety of contexts.

Analysis of millennials and older adults’ automobility behavior in Hamilton, Ontario

ABSTRACT This study explores the automobility behavior of millennials (those born between 1980 and 2000) and older adults (65 years and older) and the factors that influence their automobility behavior using cross-sectional data from Hamilton, Ontario. This study focuses specifically on how automobility behavior of millennials and older adults is shaped by their socio-demographic characteristics, living arrangements, attitudes, and preferences toward transportation modes and residential location characteristics. Results from the binomial and ordinal logistic regressions suggest that depending on whether a millennial or older adult lives alone, with a partner, or in an apartment, their automobility behavior differs. The study also finds that positive attitudes and preferences toward sustainable travel behavior make both generations less auto-oriented, especially millennials. Regarding preferred residential location characteristics, compared to older adults, millennials’ preference toward off-street parking in their residential neighborhood is likely to influence their automobile use. Compared to older adults, living arrangements, attitudes, and preferences influence, to a greater extent, millennials’ attributes of automobility. Further, the study also suggests that living arrangements, attitudes, and preferences can differ among millennials and older adults. Consequently, the impact on each of the attributes of automobility behavior will differ.

Designing of the quest-tour itinerary «Early 19th century. German cultural heritage in Kharkiv»

Purpose. The continuous evolutionary change in consumer preferences encourages the travel business to continuously look for innovative forms and techniques to meet consumer demand. There is a growing demand in the travel, tourism and hospitality sector for unique, personalized and sustainable travel. In this regard, the search for creative solutions to create highly competitive travel and sightseeing products that take into account current trends in consumer preferences is relevant. One possible avenue in this context is the creation of cultural heritage tourism products. The purpose of this study is to improve approaches to the design of cultural heritage quest-tour itineraries and to test the recommendations developed.
 Results. Creative tourism plays an important role in developing and maintaining interest in cultural heritage. The creation of travel and sightseeing products based on a combination of the concepts of heritage tourism and creative tourism allows meeting the consumer demand for uniqueness, authenticity, personalization, creative involvement and self-development. It is this combination of modern, innovative types of travel and sightseeing that we consider most promising in terms of providing highly competitive, unique products. Quest-tour is a type of travel and sightseeing service, which can be successfully used in the creation of heritage tourism products in the context of modern trends of changing consumer preferences. Itinerary design techniques for heritage quest-tour should take into account the significance of the excursion sites in terms of presenting the atmosphere of the era in question; the degree of preservation of authentic excursion sites; and the amount of available factual material. In this study, we tested the technique of designing the quest-tour itinerary on the example of our developed quest-tour «Early 19th century. German cultural heritage in Kharkiv». According to the storyline, the quest-tour is about almost the earliest documented period of ethnic German life in Kharkiv.
 Scientific novelty. The scientific novelty of the study lies in the improvement of the designing technique for quest-tours of cultural heritage on the basis of overlapping the concepts of heritage tourism and creative tourism.
 Practical value. The value of the study lies in the practical validation of the improved technique of designing heritage quest-tours, as well as the possibility of using the results in the practical activities of travel firms in the design of excursion products.

Post-pandemic travel patterns of remote tech workers

Almost half of all jobs in the San Francisco Bay Area are “remote-eligible” – more than any other metropolitan area in the United States, due to the high concentration of employees in the technology sector who were early to embrace teleworking at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020. Any significant share of these tech workers staying remote may have profound long-term impacts on aggregate travel patterns in the region. This research seeks to predict the magnitude of these impacts and derive insights about the newly learned behaviors of tech workers, as indicative of remote-eligible workers in general.A survey of over 660 tech workers ran from November 2021 to March 2022, asking about participants’ employers and remote work policies, commute details and mode preferences, non-work trips, and interest in relocation.Respondents expected employer-driven hybrid arrangements of 2–3 days per week in the office after the pandemic, which in turn dictated the number of predicted future commuting trips and suppressed interest in relocation. Though almost half of respondents expressed interest in moving, they only planned to move a median of 20.93 miles – staying within the region but shifting away from their offices and towards less dense and more automobile-oriented suburban neighborhoods.Additionally, those moving more than ten miles from their office are likely to switch to less sustainable travel modes. On the other hand, robust observed retention of online shopping habits for groceries and food delivery may mitigate the added vehicle trips caused by rebound effects.

Contributing Factors to the Changes in Public and Private Transportation Mode Choice after the COVID-19 Outbreak in Urban Areas of China

The COVID-19 pandemic has tremendously affected the whole of human society worldwide. Travel patterns have greatly changed due to the increased risk perception and the governmental interventions regarding COVID-19. This study aimed to identify contributing factors to the changes in public and private transportation mode choice behavior in China after COVID-19 based on an online questionnaire survey. In the survey, travel behaviors in three periods were studied: before the outbreak (before 27 December 2019), the peak (from 20 January to 17 March 2020), and after the peak (from 18 March to the date of the survey). A series of random-parameter bivariate Probit models was developed to quantify the relationship between individual characteristics and the changes in travel mode choice. The key findings indicated that individual sociodemographic characteristics (e.g., gender, age, ownership, occupation, residence) have significant effects on the changes in mode choice behavior. Other key findings included (1) a higher propensity to use a taxi after the peak compared to urban public transportation (i.e., bus and subway); (2) a significant impact of age on the switch from public transit to private car and two-wheelers; (3) more obvious changes in private car and public transportation modes in more developed cities. The findings from this study are expected to be useful for establishing partial and resilient policies and ensuring sustainable mobility and travel equality in the post-pandemic era.

Baggage dissociation for sustainable air travel: Design study of ground baggage distribution networks

Dissociation of passenger travel from baggage delivery has been proposed as one of the radical innovations in future air travel. This concept is still relatively new and largely unexplored, so there are many issues that need to be resolved. For instance, a complete end-to-end baggage dissociation will require the ground distribution networks to deliver passenger luggage to and from the departing and arriving airports. This paper proposes to design such networks as the existing parcel delivery networks. In particular, baggage sorting centers (BSCs) can serve as local hubs for creasing a scalable, multi-level topology of the delivery network in order to manage baggage flows in a given geographical area around the selected airports. Assuming the population density as a proxy for estimating the baggage delivery service demands, the optimum locations of BSCs are determined by formulating and solving the standard p-median and the maximal covering location problems. The numerical results were obtained for Greater London, and also for the whole UK assuming all its major civilian airports. The Greater London area could be served by 36 BSCs to achieve a full service coverage. The 90% service coverage of the whole UK can be achieved by about the same number of BSCs, provided that the coverage distance is increased. In practice, the actual number of required BSCs crucially depends on the operational and capital costs, and the maximum processing capacity of each BSC. These findings have direct implications on the long-term planning and innovations in future air transport.

Dynamic tradable credit scheme for multimodal urban networks

A Tradable Credit Scheme (TCS) is a demand management policy aiming for more sustainable travel behavior. The regulator defines the total credit cap and the credit distribution; it also determines the credit charges for each travel alternative at different times of the day, which modifies the perceived users’ costs. The credit price is determined by trading of credits between travelers. Defining the credit scheme at the urban level and estimating its impacts on user travel decisions and the network congestion dynamics is challenging. We propose a framework wherein travelers change their departure times and choose between solo car driving, Public Transportation (PT), and carpooling to complete their trips under a dynamic TCS, meaning the credit charge is time-dependent. A multimodal macroscopic traffic simulator based on a generalized bathtub model captures the congestion dynamics for the different transport modes. Additionally, we consider different values of time, trip lengths, and desired arrival times for the demand profile.The proposed TCS minimizes the total travel cost, (the sum of all travelers’ travel costs) and the carbon emissions by solving an optimization problem through an iterative method, including an inner loop that updates the users’ choices and credit price under the stochastic user equilibrium principle; and an outer loop that updates the credit charge profile. The methodology is implemented and applied to a realistic test case in Lyon (France). The dynamic TCS profiles result in 36% fewer carbon emissions than static TCS for a total travel cost reduction of 19%. Besides, 94% of the travelers benefit from the TCS as their user costs decrease in the case study. The final results are compared with a more advanced simulation framework, which is too computationally expensive to find the optimal TCS. The proposed TCS is effective with refined traffic dynamics representation.

Enhancing consumption of sustainable transportation: Determinants and outcome of consumer engagement with bike-sharing service.

Bike-sharing service has become a popular sustainable means of transportation due to its direct impact on traffic congestion, energy consumption, the environment, and people's quality of life. Existing literature suggests that sustainable consumption can be promoted by engaging consumers with green products. This study examined drivers and the outcome of consumer engagement with bike-sharing services based on the technology acceptance model (TAM). A survey was conducted to collect the data from the users of the bike-sharing service in Kuala Lumpur. Structural equation modelling was used to analyse the data and find the relationship between variables. The empirical analyses showed that perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness of the bike-sharing service positively impact all facets of consumer engagement with bike-sharing service, which subsequently influences the continuance usage intention of bike-sharing service. The findings of this study offer useful insights that could enhance the consumption of bike-sharing service. This study also offers some guidelines to transportation practitioners, policymakers, and urban planners regarding promoting healthy and sustainable travel behaviour among urban commuters through bike-sharing service.

Visual Exploration of Cycling Semantics with GPS Trajectory Data

Cycling—as a sustainable and convenient exercise and travel mode—has become increasingly popular in modern cities. In recent years, with the proliferation of sport apps and GPS mobile devices in daily life, the accumulated cycling trajectories have opened up valuable opportunities to explore the underlying cycling semantics to enable a better cycling experience. In this paper, based on large-scale GPS trajectories and road network data, we mainly explore cycling semantics from two perspectives. On one hand, from the perspective of the cyclists, trajectories could tell their frequently visited sequences of streets, thus potentially revealing their hidden cycling themes, i.e., cyclist behavior semantics. On the other hand, from the perspective of the road segments, trajectories could show the cyclists’ fine-grained moving features along roads, thus probably uncovering the moving semantics on roads. However, the extraction and understanding of such cycling semantics are nontrivial, since most of the trajectories are raw data and it is also difficult to aggregate the dynamic moving features from trajectories into static road segments. To this end, we establish a new visual analytic system called VizCycSemantics for pervasive computing, in which a topic model (i.e., LDA) is used to extract the topics of cyclist behavior semantics and moving semantics on roads, and a clustering method (i.e., k-means ++) is used to further capture the groups of similar cyclists and road segments within the city; finally, multiple interactive visual interfaces are implemented to facilitate the interpretation for analysts. We conduct extensive case studies in the city of Beijing to demonstrate the effectiveness and practicability of our system and also obtain various insightful findings and pieces of advice.