Potential influences on explaining walking distance from home to access public transport are investigated, including trip and demographic characteristics and public transport supply. In Sydney, Australia, people walk farther to the train than to the bus, the distributions of walking distances are different for each mode, and the trip and demographic characteristics of train and bus users are different. Given the decision to walk to public transport, demographic characteristics such as age, gender, income, and labor force status and trip characteristics such as trip purpose, time of day and week, fare and ticket type, and trip duration are not significant in explaining walking distance to each mode of public transport. The mode of the public transport trip is the most important determinant of walking distance, reflecting the different supply and spacing of each mode. For instance, there are many more bus stops than train stations. The differences between train and bus users suggest that accessibility initiatives for public transport might not be the same for each mode.a rhonda

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Abstract

Flexible transport services include a range of passenger transport mobility offers, where services are flexible in one or more of the dimensions of route, vehicle allocation, vehicle operator, type of payment and passenger category. Although flexible transport services are used increasingly in Europe and the USA as part of the public transport mix where regular services are not sustainable, there are few working examples of these services in urban Australia, although there are many opportunities. Through a series of semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders in New South Wales, Australia, the article identifies barriers to greater use of flexible transport services in low-density urban areas. These five sets of barriers include: institutional frameworks such as regulation; economic issues of funding and cost; operational issues such as fleet and vehicles; operator and community attitudes, awareness and cultures; and information and education. The article makes recommendations to enable and encourage greater use of flexible transport services by transport service planners and providers as part of the public transport mix in low-density urban environments where it can be more difficult to provide regular and scheduled public transport.

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