RESEARCH ARTICLE
Factors Affecting Public Transportation Ridership in a High-income Developing Country
Khaled Shaaban1, *, Abdulla Siam2
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2023Volume: 17
E-location ID: e187444782212303
Publisher ID: e187444782212303
DOI: 10.2174/18744478-v17-e230109-2022-28
Article History:
Received Date: 25/6/2022Revision Received Date: 15/10/2022
Acceptance Date: 4/11/2022
Electronic publication date: 31/1/2023
Collection year: 2023
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Background:
In rich developing countries, the increased rate of car use has major implications in terms of pollution, noise, and congestion problems. One of the main solutions to these problems is to find ways to promote the use of other transportation modes. The first step in this process is identifying the factors affecting the use of these modes.
Aim:
In Qatar, a major bus service was introduced to address the fast-growing transportation demands in urban areas. This study was initiated to explore the factors influencing public bus ridership in Qatar. The goal is to understand the influence of various attributes at the stop-level of the existing public buses.
Methods:
Multiple linear regression models were developed to identify the parameters significantly influencing stop-level boarding and alighting.
Results:
The results indicate that land use and population parameters significantly affected the existing bus ridership in Qatar. The population parameters include the number of persons available in the catchment area for residing, working, visiting restaurants, and shopping. Land use parameters include the number of shopping places, the number of restaurants, and the number of mosques.
Conclusion:
This information can help policymakers and public authorities to develop policies and plans to increase bus usage in Qatar.