The substantial changes in bus fares and service levels which were introduced in Telford, Shropshire, on 1 April, 1978 provided a suitable context in which to estimate elasticities of bus passenger demand using data collected in special surveys before and after the implementation of the changes. The study found evidence that shopping trips by bus had been redistributed between the various shopping centres in Telford in response to changes in relative fares and service levels. When a method of estimating elasticities which eliminated redistribution effects was used, fare elasticities for shopping trips were estimated to lie in the range -0.58 to -0.80. Shopping seemed to be fairly insensitive to changes in service frequency, but elasticities with respect to a weighted combination of walking, waiting and in-vehicle time were estimated in the range -0.55 to -0.71. The surveys indicated that trips made for non-shopping purposes (approximately two-thirds of which were work and education trips) are generally less sensitive to fares than shopping trips. for these trips, fare elasticities ranged between -0.32 and -0.46. Elasticities for non-shopping trips with respect to buses per hour were between 0.29 and 0.37 while elasticities relative to the combined walk, wait and in-vehicle times varied between -0.43 and -0.76. (Author/publisher)
Abstract