Making public transport the choice mode

• Main Author: Tan, Siew Fong
• Other Authors: Gopinath Menon
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2016
• Subjects: DRNTU::Engineering
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/68118
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Today, 12% of Singapore’s land area has been used for transport. As our population and economy grows, there would be an increasing demand for transportation. Our transport system needs to grow correspondingly to cater to the increasingly diverse needs of commuters. The public transport system has grown by leaps and bounds since its inception in the 1920s for buses and 1980s for trains. Though massive improvement had taken place in the recent years, there is no denial that public transportation is still under the public scrutiny. Each commuter will have their own set of issues and factors that will affect their perception towards public transport. With the improved standard of living and development growth in recent years, commuters had also formed higher expectations towards public transportation. Thus, there is a need to look into creative ways to make the use of public transport more attractive in the eyes of commuters. This study focuses on public bus and seeks to understand Singapore’s public transport system from the users’ perspective. The objective of this study is to design a questionnaire and conduct a pilot survey among commuters to determine what affects their travel experience on public transport in order to identify the top three factors that could enhance travel experience for the commuters. This project is a joint collaboration with Public Transport Council who might incorporate some results of the pilot survey to design one on a larger scale. From our analysis, results have shown that the top three factors that are the most important to commuters are (1) Reliability: Frequency of buses, (2) Safety and Security: Driver does not drive recklessly, (3) Comfort: Cleanliness of the bus. From our findings, we also noted that there is significant difference in the responses between heavy and non-heavy bus users on having a bus stop within a 5 minute walk from home. Results also suggest that the highest satisfaction rating with regards to the level of importance is accessibility, with reliability being the least satisfied. It can be seen that commuters are fairly satisfied with each service attribute as the mean values hover around an average of 5 in the 7 point Likert scale. However, there is still a need to constantly improve the public transportation services to fulfill the increasing needs of the commuters so as to bridge the gap between the high expectations from the public and reality.