01625872

Component

As large numbers of immigrants continue to settle in the US over the next decades, planners will want to consider how this demographic trend could impact urban transportation patterns, including public transit use. This paper uses intercept survey data from 1,247 public transit riders in the San Francisco Bay Area to explore how mode choices and travel experiences may differ for low-income immigrants as compared to higher-income immigrants and US-born residents. Low-income immigrants were less likely to have a bus pass or access to a bicycle. They were also far more likely to substitute driving for taking public transit than all other immigrant and income groups. The results suggest that while several public transit experiences are similar across immigrant status and income groups, transportation access for low-income immigrants is more constrained and alternative modes may need to be negotiated when public transit does not serve they types of trips they need to make. The results also underscore the importance of collecting data on country of origin in conjunction with travel behavior data, because travel behavior and experiences are in some ways more burdensome for low-income immigrants than for other groups.

This paper was sponsored by TRB committee ADD20 Standing Committee on Social and Economic Factors of Transportation.

01618707

17-02241

English

0000-0001-8966-5778

0000-0003-2328-0263

0000-0001-5475-8544

19p

2017

Transportation Research Board 96th Annual Meeting

Digital/other

Figures; Maps; References; Tables

Attitudes; Immigrants; Low income groups; Mode choice; Public transit; Travel behavior

San Francisco Bay Area

Planning and Forecasting; Public Transportation; Society

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2017 Paper #17-02241

TRIS, TRB, ATRI

Dec 8 2016 10:50AM