Maturing motorization and household travel: The case of nuclear-family households: Fid-Bau Portal

Maturing motorization and household travel: The case of nuclear-family households

Kitamura, Ryuichi / Kostyniuk, Lidia P.

Abstract The effect of car ownership on household travel behavior diminishes as a society becomes motorized. The statistical analysis of this study shows that households without cars have travel patterns distinct from those households that own cars. Maturing motorization, however, implies that only a small number of households fall in this category. At the same time the differences in household travel patterns between one-car households and multi-car households, or between two-car households and households with three or more cars, are much less significant. Consequently, car ownership no longer exhibits a strong association with observed household travel patterns. The study further shows that household structure expressed as stage in lifecycle accounts for as much or more variations in travel pattern indicators as do household size, income, number of workers, number of adults, number of drivers and number of cars. Activity engagement and hence trip rate is determined largely by lifecycle stage, not by car ownership. It is also shown that driver-trip time expenditure and number of driver trips have less systematic variations across lifecycle stages, indicating nonlinear relationships between household person trip generation and car trip generation, vehicle-miles traveled, and transportation facility usage.