Shared Use Travel Behavior for Improving Rural Mobility: Insights from Greene County, Pennsylvania
Rural communities are considered disadvantaged communities as they suffer from a lack of transport options. Thus, rural regionsprovide less accessibility for commuters to reach their destination as opposed to urban regions. However, the issues of transport disadvantageand shared use mobility in rural areas within the United States (US) have not been well investigated. Furthermore, transport disadvantagediffers between communities and regions across the globe; thus, there is a need to study the behavioral choices of rural commuters within theUS context. This study contributes by analyzing the behavioral choices of rural communities within the US through a case study site ofWaynesburg, Pennsylvania, for adopting a shared use shuttle service. K-means clusters showed that trips from the survey data were a goodrepresentation of real trips from Ecolane. Furthermore, random parameter-based binary logit models were calibrated using data collected fromstudents, faculty, and residents in Waynesburg, Greene County, to study the behavioral choices of commuters. The findings for the faculty andstudents group revealed that prior experience with shared services increases the likelihood of using a shared shuttle. An important personalcharacteristic of inconvenience showed a higher propensity toward using existing modes as opposed to a shared shuttle. Such commutersvalue personal vehicles as more convenient as they have childcare responsibilities and varying schedules for work that require them to moveback and forth across locations, thus making a shared shuttle less attractive for them. The socioeconomic factors of age and gender show ahigher propensity for using shared shuttles. Furthermore, the findings from this study could be helpful for agencies in improving rural mobility andconsidering such shared mobility services for rural communities
- Research Organization:
- Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Office of Sustainable Transportation. Vehicle Technologies Office (VTO)
- Grant/Contract Number:
- EE0008883
- OSTI ID:
- 2352761
- Journal Information:
- Journal of Transportation Engineering, Part A: Systems, Journal Name: Journal of Transportation Engineering, Part A: Systems Journal Issue: 8 Vol. 150; ISSN 2473-2907
- Publisher:
- American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE)Copyright Statement
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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