In-vehicle crowding: Integrating tangible attributes, attitudes, and perceptions in a choice context between BRT and metro

Abstract Understanding in-vehicle crowding is crucial to improving public transportation service levels. Although in-vehicle crowding has usually been studied as a tangible attribute, previous research has shown that the standing passenger density cannot fully explain the experience of crowding. In the present work, we used the hybrid discrete choice modeling approach in order to provide a richer explanation of in-vehicle crowding in a choice context between Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) and Metro, using Bogota as a case of study. Modeling results showed that perceived discomfort, perceived insecurity, waiting time, fare, travel time, and its interaction with the positive attitude towards crowding, are the main variables in explaining the choice process. We found that the positive attitude towards crowding affects the perception of the standing passengers’ density level. We demonstrated that this attitude depends on non-transportation information since people who live in larger spaces, as well as people who live in apartments, have a greater positive attitude towards crowding. We obtained crowding multipliers in regarding the users’ attitude for different levels of overcrowding and analyze several policies related to latent variables.