The Key Contributing Factors of Customized Shuttle Bus in Rush Hour: a Case Study in Harbin City

Recently, the policy to reduce private car sharing and switch the private car users to public transportation has gained much attention. Research has shown the accordance that developing public transportation to promote sustainable transportation. However, sometimes the subway and bus transit with high congestion level do not match the comfortable degree of demand, and the transit with fixed routes cannot satisfy the flexibility of transport. Hence, the customized shuttle bus becomes a new way of public transportation. Most studies on the implementation and application of customized shuttle bus are only for large cities. However, limited studies have been conducted on the key contributing factors of customized shuttle bus in medium city. In this paper, Harbin City, the capital city of Heilongjiang Province, is selected as the case study. The contingent valuable method is employed and 332 individuals complete in the SP (Stated Preference) and RP (Revealed Preference) survey to measure the individual willingness to choose customized shuttle bus. Key contributing factors that are expected to influence customized shuttle bus are analyzed by logistic regressions. The results show that there are four key contributing factors that influence people to choose customized shuttle bus, which are private car, distance between home and work place, travel satisfaction level and work overtime. Finally, some suitable proposals for the implementation of customized shuttle bus are proposed, which are helpful to make public transportation policy in Harbin and other developing cities. (C) 2016 Published by Elsevier Ltd.