Examining of İstanbul public transportation system perception with revealed and stated preferences framework by logit model

Liveability of urban areas can be explained with availability of afforfable infrastructure and socail facilities that are provided and especially with how users/citizens percieve these facilities. Nowadays, rapid urbanization process is obvious and observable in cities. Population increases in urban areas, on the other hand, population in rural areas decreases. Forwardlooking development strategies are clarified and decisions are made with a specific prediction in development plans. However, in some cases especially when the urbanization process comes up with something inconvenient from the development plans, current demand exceeds the predicted/expected demand of development plans. Thus, provided services and facilities becomes inadequate. Transportation is not only one of the most important facilities but also one of the most important variable of the urban economics. Therefore, it is also one of the top facilities that can be affected by the unplanned development. Transportation is the circulatory/cardiovascular system of urban areas. Any anomally in this system affects urban life that causes the expected demand to be inadequate, which results in as, traffic jam, more crowded public transport facilities, increase of waiting time in traffic, increase of value of time of users, increase of travel costs, increase of negative externalities and increase of negative effect of transportation on environmental system. Transportation related negative externatilies can be illustrated as, air pollution caused by gas emission, noise pollution and stress caused by traffic itself. Morever, any -economic or humanitarian- loss caused by accidents are also example of negative externalities. It is not neccessary to use a transportation mode to be affected negatively by the transportation system, which can be considered as an externality. Besides, transportation system and traffic can be enhanced however, these services should be supplied in a quality way. If the quality is defined as meeting the demands of users, it is not wrong to say that public transport system is qualified enough if it can meet the demands of users. Users do not only aim to maximize the economic utility but also await a good quality service in decision making process. Therefore, it should be taken into consideration how users percieve the supplied services and what they expect from them. In this study, it is touched on urban area perception, transportation system perception ve as a sub title of transportation system, public transport perception from users' perspective. Urban area perception of a person is shaped with many variable such as; urban infrastruces facilities, urban and socail facilities, socio-cultural facilities, and adequacy of services. These variables are also the ones which define the quality of life at the same time. Users will make a choice from the transportation modes that are supplied with the help of the decision which is made by how they percieve the system. Public transport perception of a person is related to who he/she percieves the supplied services with respect to the service variables mentioned above. These variables can be examined in two types as quantitative and qualitative. Quantitative variables are measurable and can be illustrated as; travel time, travel cost, public transport frequency and waiting time at bus stop and etc. On the other hand, qualitative variables are unmeasurable and can be exampled as crowdedness, stress and tiredness. In this thesis study, 175 surveys are conducted in four center towns of İstanbul which are Beşiktaş, Şişli, Kadıköy and Üsküdar. Survey form consists of two parts. In the first part, users are asked about their mode choices and asked to evaluate the current transportation system facilities. That type of survey is also known as "Revealed Preference". In the second part, a virtual survey is conducted and users are asked about their expectations and wishes on transportation system. This type of survey is known as "Stated Preference". In this way, it is identified what the users' expectations from transportation system are, how the users' perception of transportation system is and what kind of developments users expect. In the second part of the survey, it is asked how much money users will to pay in what condition. Conditions are as follows; Safety, Crowdedness, Stress and Motivation Loss and Tiredness. With respect to these four topics, it is examined what kind of enhancement make a user to chance his/her mode choice. Binary Logit Model is used to do so. Considering the results of data analysis, most users think transportation system is inadequate in terms of safety. Besides, Crowdedness and Tiredness are the secondary variables and Stress and Motivation Loss come after. As users point Learned Helplessness cause the Stress factor to be less important than Safety and Crowdedness. What is more, it is examined what users expect from transportation system and to do so, it is analysed in what situation users will to pay most for a new public transport mode. Turns out, Stress and Loss of Motivation are the most crucial variables. Namely, it can be said users will to pay mostly to prevent from stress.