Examining changes in transit passenger travel behavior through a Smart Card activity analysis

Abstract

Transit passenger behavior is an area of major interest for public transportation agencies. The relationship between ridership and maintenance projects, however, is unexplored but increasingly relevant in the era of aging infrastructure. This thesis bridges this gap by analyzing changes in Smart Card activity for a sample of rail commuters during a large scale maintenance project in Chicago. Results show that between 8% and 11% of the passengers used the bus system as a commuting alternative while the majority of them continued using the train under deteriorated service conditions. Comparisons to a control zone show that between 2% and 7% of the commuters did not use transit for their trips. Using the observed results, we model the shift from rail to bus using a binary logit model. Implications of the findings are discussed.