Evaluating the Effects of Multi-Modal Travel Information Based on the Principle of Relative Utility Maximization

Abstract

It’s well known that information plays a significant role in influencing individual travel decisions, however, intelligent transportation system (ITS) deployment becomes slow these days. To provide additional evidence that the provision of information is effective in promoting modal shift, this paper attempts to establish a new nested choice model based on the principle of relative utility maximization (called r_NL model), in order to properly evaluate the effects of multi-modal travel information, which is expected to encourage the use of transit systems and consequently to mitigate traffic congestion. The principle of relative utility maximization assumes that an individual chooses an alternative with the highest relative utility considering his/her relative interests in alternatives from choice set. The new model can be used to represent unequal, asymmetric and heterogeneous choice structures of decisionmakers under the influence of incomplete information and context dependence. The effectiveness of the r_NL model was empirically confirmed by using a stated preference data collected in Japan. It turns out that the provision of multi-modal travel information can increase the users of a reliable transit system by 7-11%, reduce the car users by 3-5% and also leads to the decrease of bus users by 4-6%.

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