Effects of a travel information service

Principal Investigator
Nina Waara

Co-workers
Ralf Risser
Agneta Ståhl

Contact
Nina Waara
+46 46 222 91 25
nina.waara@tft.lth.se

Project Description
Elderly and disabled people’s information needs before making a trip by public transport, and the importance of information for accomplishing the trip have been demonstrated in a licentiate thesis from Lund Institute of Technology. The results have been used for a travellers’ information service on Internet (TågplusGuiden Serviceinfo).

This project evaluates the usefulness of the information service, whether it fills a function, for whom and in what way. It shows what considerations were significant for the information content in the finished information service in relation to the expressed information needs. The study covers users, operators, authorities and municipalities.

Users
Five main questions are studied: do people know about the system, what do they think about it, do they use it, what type of trips do they use it for and what information is most important for these trips. The answers will be compared with the needs expressed in the licentiate thesis. Approximately 3,000 questionnaires were distributed to elderly and disabled users in Bergslagen, to members of the same organizations as in the licentiate thesis.

Operators
The main question here is whether the information system has given the operators more passengers. Has the information system encouraged more elderly and disabled people to use public transport? In other words, is there an incentive for the operator to provide the information? About 10–15 individual interviews have been conducted.

Authorities and municipalities
The project investigates the effects of the information system on the use of special transportation service, whether people know about the system, whether they use it, how they use it etc. Has the system led elderly and disabled people to make more trips by public transport, has the planning of journeys by special transportation service been affected? What incentives are there for traffic principals and municipalities to provide travel information of this kind?

The results are expected to show the effects of the information service that has been built up in order to encourage travel among elderly and disabled people. The intention is to examine whether the information service has any such effects, and if so why/why not. Effects for operators, traffic principals, authorities and municipalities are also investigated.

By studying whose/what perspective has been applied in the development of the system and the effects it has had at different levels, interesting conclusions can be drawn about continued development of the system and similar systems, incentives to provide an information service in order to get more elderly and disabled people to travel, and also the possibility to use this type of soft factors to contribute to increased accessibility in public transport for elderly and disabled users.

Timeline
The first part of the project started as a doctoral project in 1997 which ended in a licentiate thesis in 2001. In 2006 the second part of the doctoral project started.

Funding Sources
The Swedish Transport Administration
Vinnova (Reserch and Innovation for Sustainable Growth)

Selected Publications
Waara, N., Börjesson, M., & Ståhl, A. (1999). Äldre och funktionshindrade resenärer – krav och förvänt­ningar på ett informationssystem för kollektivtrafik med tåg och buss. Institutionen för Teknik och samhälle, LTH, Lund.

Waara, N., Ståhl, A. (2004). The need of information in public transport - elderly and disabled peoples pre-journey travel information requirements, in Proceedings from the the 10th International Conference on Mobility and Transport for Elderly and Disabled Persons - TRANSED 2004, Hamamatsu, Japan, pp.

Waara, N. (2007). Attitudes toward public transport among elderly in sparsely populated areas. 11th International Conference on Mobility and Transport for Elderly and Disabled Persons (TRANSED), 2007, Montreal, Canada.

Waara, N., Risser, R., Ståhl, A. (2012) Exploring influence of online traveller information services in older peoples and peoples with functional limitations travel in public transport: A mixed methods approach. Technology and Disability. In press.

Thesis
Waara, N. (2001). The need of information in public transport – Elderly and disabled people’s pre-journey travel information requirements. Licentiate Thesis. Bulletin 206. Department of Technology and Society, Faculty of Engineering, Lund University, Lund.