Synthesis of socio demographics and activitytravel characteristics of urban dwellers incorporating intra household interactions and day of week effects

Abstract

Transportation planning process, which primarily depends on travel demand forecasts, newlinehelps in formulating strategies for effective and efficient operation of transportation newlinefacilities. Activity-based approach provides realistic and policy sensitive travel demand newlineforecasts, as it views travel as a demand derived from the need to pursue activities and newlineconsiders explicitly the travel behaviour of people. However, this approach requires newlinedetailed disaggregate data, which is a major challenge in developing economies due to newlinethe resource constraints. Population synthesis is emerging as a feasible alternative to the newlinecollection of micro-level data. newlineThis research aims to provide better understanding of individual s travel behaviour newlinein an activity-based modelling platform, in the context of a city in a developing newlinecountry. The main objective of this work is to synthesise the socio-demographics and newlineactivity-travel characteristics of population, incorporating intra-household interactions newlineand day of week effects. The scope of the work is limited to understanding based on the newlinedatabase of Calicut Municipal Corporation, Kerala State, India, which is selected as the newlinestudy area. newlineAn activity-travel diary was designed, evaluated and modified based on pilot newlinesurvey. This diary inquires details on household, personal and activity-travel newlineinformation of individuals. Both face-to-face interview technique and questionnaire newlinedrop off and pick up methods were used for data collection. The database consists of newlinehousehold details of 9901 households, personal details and one day activity-travel newlinedetails of 39637 persons, intra-household interaction details and one week travel details newlineof 2777 persons from 705 householdsPreliminary analysis of data was followed by development of statistical models for newlineactivity participation, activity-travel pattern, mode choice, intra-household interaction newlineand day of week specific activity-travel pattern. Individuals are categorised into newlineworking people, students, home-makers and other persons. newline