Research project MD/DD/18 (Research action MD)
Research objectives
The primary objective of this project is to realise an analysis of activity chains. This should allow a better comprehension of how the way in which Belgian households organise their activities influences their demands for mobility. This analysis also has to be able to show how policies having an effect on the behaviour of households can play a role in sustainable mobility.
Methodology
Firstly a national survey on the mobility behaviour of Belgians has to be carried out. This survey will be organised according to a methodology with which activity chains can be taken into account. This survey will also be the consummation of the methodological research carried out within the ‘Impacts’ part of this Programme for Sustainable Development (project MD/DD/16 Development and pilot-testing of a national households travel survey). It will allow a data collection that is consistent with the way data are collected in other countries, especially those of the European Union (given the involvement of the GRT in and the co-ordination with the European Programmes MEST and TEST). This survey will also meet the wishes of the actors involved in mobility in Belgium who we were able to bring together in a ‘users group’ for the abovementioned project MD/DD/16. To be able to obtain a data base sufficient for the different objectives set, this survey needs a representative sample of at least 12000 households that covers all the Belgian regions.
The primary goal of this survey, though, is to give us the base of socio-economic data necessary to realise a descriptive analysis of activity chains that allows a statistical representation of households’ behaviour in the organisation of their activities and its influence on their mobility demands.
While the survey is being carried out we will study the literature to broaden our knowledge of activity chains. This will allow us to gather the necessary methodological support for an analysis of activity chains, the primary goal of this survey. This analysis will be based on socio-economic data and patterns of activity chains, both gathered in the survey, to establish the relation between the characteristics of a household and the way in which it organises its activities. This descriptive analysis should allow a statistical generalisation to obtain the activity chains of the whole of the Belgian population. It could eventually also be used for the development of a generation model of activity chains.
This first phase will result in a statistical description of the activity chains of Belgian households. It will also allow us to analyse the effects of the introduction of new policies and of the way in which the population will modify its behaviour accordingly.
In the second phase of this project we will study the relation between activity chains and the demand for mobility. This study will be based on a model that we have partly developed within the framework of the Impulse Programme ‘Transport and Mobility’. PACSIM is a dynamic, behavioural and multi-modal assignment model of urban transport of people. The model will be transformed into an ‘executor of activity chains’. The input will no longer be simply an Origin-Destination matrix representing traffic demand, but rather activity chain data, from which the mobility demand of a household will be deducted. The model to do this will use the data gathered in the survey to establish the link between activities and trips.
Next, the assignment model can be used to simulate the traffic resulting from these activities. The dynamic character of the model allows to take into account the temporal evolution of traffic and the effects on the spatio-temporal variation of mobility caused by the effects of certain policies influencing activity chains. Because of its multi-modal character it can also consider the different modes of transport that the members of a household can use (and, consequently, the changes in modal choice caused by changes in activity chains).
Potential users
Firstly, the national survey will yield a large set of data concerning mobility in Belgium. The efforts made to realise this national survey could thus be consummated by putting the results of our survey at the disposal of all the actors involved: governmental administrations, mobility organisations, other research groups in this field, etc..
Furthermore, we will use modern techniques like the Internet to facilitate the dissemination of our results. A WWW-site will be created in which we will present the survey methodology we used and make the data accessible. Procedures will be developed for remote consultation and statistical treatment of the data (over the Internet). We will make sure to also develop control mechanisms to avoid that people visiting our website will make unwarranted interpretations and faulty generalisations.
Once we will have realised the whole range of ‘classical’ analyses on the data gathered in the survey, we will publish a report that will present a statistical picture of the mobility situation in Belgium.
Regarding activity chains, we will make and disseminate a report with the descriptive analysis of these activity chains and their relations with the socio-economic characteristics of the households surveyed.
The different analysis tools that we will have developed in this stage of research related to activity chains can be very useful to decision makers. These tools can help them to measure the effects on mobility of some of their political measures even if they do not directly concern sustainable mobility but rather certain sociological, economic or demographic parameters. Our analyses can show how changes in these parameters will modify the organisation of activities of households on, from there on, their demand for mobility.
We will also have developed an ‘executor’ of activity chains that can be used to simulate spatio-temporal variations of traffic induced by the modifications in activity chains.
Link to Sustainable Development
The results we want to obtain are, on the one hand, a base of socio-economic data on the behaviour of Belgian households in relation to their activities and their trips, and, on the other hand, a descriptive analysis which gives a statistical picture of activity chains. Through an ‘executor’ of activity chains we can also study the influence of the latter on the demand for mobility and thereby also the effects of political measures that modify the households’ behaviour on sustainable mobility.
Enquête nationale sur la mobilité des ménages: réalisations et résultats: rapport final
Bruxelles: SSTC, 2001 (SP0894)
[To download]
Enquête nationale sur la mobilité des ménages: réalisations et résultats: synthèse du rapport final
Bruxelles: SSTC, 2001 (SP0895)
[To download]
National household survey on mobility. Realization and results: summary report
Brussels: OSTC, 2001 (SP0896)
[To download]
