Understanding Changes in Demographics, Preferences, and Markets for Public Transportation (2018) / Chapter Skim
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Pages 7-26
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7 Transit managers, planners, and stakeholders need to understand how multiple future factors might influence the nature of demand for transit services in North America. For this study, TCRP Research Report 201: Understanding Changes in Demographics, Preferences, and Markets for Public Transportation, the research team created a set of future scenarios for transit markets to understand how shifts in demographics, attitudes, and levels of service might affect demand for transit.
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8 Understanding Changes in Demographics, Preferences, and Markets for Public Transportation which is the subject of this report. In addition, members of the research team have leveraged extensive personal experience in interpreting the NHTS results of the past several decades.
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Eight Major Findings and Policy Implications 9 Age and Transit Ridership Age provides the most consistent reference point for the analysis of how the demographics of the traveler affect travel preferences, characteristics of the traveler's residential location, and the modes available for a specific trip. Chapter 2 explores this topic in greater detail and examines age as an organizing factor among many interrelated factors that affect transit use in North America.
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10 Understanding Changes in Demographics, Preferences, and Markets for Public Transportation it aged. This cohort's experience touches on the central research question: to what extent will those in the 25- to 34-year-old age group continue their current level of transit orientation?
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Eight Major Findings and Policy Implications 11 Figure 4 shows that there is a wide difference between the propensity of Hispanics and non-Hispanics to take transit at all income levels. However, the research team found that this difference is not attributable to differing levels of transit service quality within residential neighborhoods.
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12 Understanding Changes in Demographics, Preferences, and Markets for Public Transportation Washington, D.C. -- had high and well-established transit ridership. These cities are categorized as "traditional cities." Beyond these cities, substantial variation by region was found.
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Eight Major Findings and Policy Implications 13 ratio (as shown in Figure 6) -- a method its developers report can stand as a surrogate for traditional indexes such as density, diversity, and design.
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14 Understanding Changes in Demographics, Preferences, and Markets for Public Transportation • Over the past 12 years, the percentage of those under 35 who would prefer to live in a big city increased significantly, with nearly 40% stating that preference in the 2016 TCRP survey; the remaining 60% were divided across a set of less urban options. • About 60% of millennials stated they would prefer to live in the suburbs in the 2014 TransitCenter survey, which used a somewhat different set of location options.
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Eight Major Findings and Policy Implications 15 Project H-51, whose findings are the subject of the current report, respondents were asked to choose between a preference for a big city, small city, suburb, small town, or rural area. The research quantitatively documented that the preference for living in a big city increased over the 12-year period between 2004 and 2016 with little variation by age group.
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16 Understanding Changes in Demographics, Preferences, and Markets for Public Transportation Present Preferences for Urban Locations As noted, over the decade, support for the most urban condition has grown. In the 2016 TCRP survey, around 40% of those under 35 reported that they preferred the "big city" option, while the other 60% of this group reported preference for small cities, the suburbs, small towns, or rural locations (five options offered)
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Eight Major Findings and Policy Implications 17 decade is clearly improving for the most urban condition, most people in both surveys preferred less-urban options when given the choice. Are the Reasons for Choosing a Home Location Changing?
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18 Understanding Changes in Demographics, Preferences, and Markets for Public Transportation When respondents in the 25–34 cohort age into the next age group, they will face new challenges. Two questions based on this project's framework then arise: 1.
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Eight Major Findings and Policy Implications 19 to less-dense settings and to use transit less. A major question for the transit industry is how to benefit from some of the basic pro-urban preferences of this group as they relocate to less transitsupportive locations.
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20 Understanding Changes in Demographics, Preferences, and Markets for Public Transportation Scenarios Negative for Transit The research team also modeled future scenarios in which the entire population in the future year adopts a set of preferences negative for transit: • At present, those over 65 have many market-oriented preferences associated with lower rates of taking public transportation. In a future scenario, if the entire population had the attitudes and preferences of the oldest market segment, the model predicts that overall transit ridership would decrease by 3%.
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Eight Major Findings and Policy Implications 21 circumstances rather than habit. The integrated travel demand models developed in this project can be helpful to better understanding what might happen in the future with alternative roles for the new services.
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22 Understanding Changes in Demographics, Preferences, and Markets for Public Transportation transportation expose them to undesirable, disturbing behavior. These concerns could affect their future choice of mode, as illustrated in the following hypothetical scenario: Millennials perceive a shared-ride car or van as being local and filled with local people, while they perceive the transit bus as being regional and filled with people "not like me" who exhibit disturbing behavior.
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Eight Major Findings and Policy Implications 23 factors (attitudes, preferences)
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24 Understanding Changes in Demographics, Preferences, and Markets for Public Transportation United States, are associated with higher use of public transportation. Transit riders today are split nearly equally nationwide between white, African-American, and Hispanic riders.
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Eight Major Findings and Policy Implications 25 Programs emphasizing that transit is a welcoming experience can be communicated through the reference to the full family, with pricing and service design policies to match. • The basic message that "people like me" use transit, value it, and approve of it should be carefully integrated into marketing strategies.
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26 Understanding Changes in Demographics, Preferences, and Markets for Public Transportation Implications for Planning and Urban Form Improving Riders' Perceptions of Safety Those who worry more about crime and other disturbing behavior are the same groups that use transit most: women, nonwhites, Hispanics, younger people, those with less formal education, and those with less income. Logically, perhaps, these are the groups who do indeed face more danger with more ridership, or at least worry about it.
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