The results of a disaggregate, multivariate analysis of the Scottish Household Survey (SHS) dataset are presented and the complex relationship between socio-economical circumstance, geographical access to local services and public transport and revealed non-work travel choices is investigated. The socio-economical and geographical diversity of Scotland offers an excellent opportunity to undertake an analysis of this nature. The SHS is a continuous, cross-sectional survey funded by the Scottish Executive and undertaken by face-to-face interview based on a sample of the general population in private residences in Scotland. It seeks to provide information on the composition, characteristics and behaviour of Scottish households. The survey collects information in two parts - firstly the highest income householder provides household level data including household composition and income, key attributes of household members, transport resources available to the household including access to public transport; secondly a randomly selected adult from the household provides information on inter alia personal travel (including the completion of a one-day travel diary on the previous day) and personal views on transport, the neighbourhood and local services. The dataset analysed in this paper was collected between 1999 and 2003 and contains over 75,000 surveyed households and over 49,000 completed travel diaries. Two other variables were matched with the residential location of SHS respondents and added to the dataset; namely, an index representing proximity to local services at electoral ward level derived in the Scottish Indices of Deprivation 2003 study and a locational classification for each respondent which captures settlement size and wider regional accessibility. The primary focus of the analysis presented in this paper is an examination of the extent to which the quality of local access to services affects distance travelled for non-work purposes. Within this analysis individual and household socio-economical circumstance, available transport resources (both car ownership and local access to public transport) and the wider regional geographical context are also taken into account. It is hypothesised that good local access is negatively associated with distance travelled and that there also exists the possibility of significant interaction between local access and socio-economical circumstance and available transport resources. Regression models are developed for non-work travel which test the statistical significance of these explanatory variables. For the covering abstract please see ITRD E135207.
Abstract