SOME REFLECTIONS ON GPS-SUPPORTED TRAVEL SURVEY METHODS IN AN INCREASINGLY ICT-RICH ENVIRONMENT

1. SOME REFLECTIONS ON GPS-SUPPORTED TRAVEL SURVEY METHODS IN AN INCREASINGLYICT-RICH ENVIRONMENT Martin LEE-GOSSELIN Prof., Dept of Urban & Regional PlanningHead of GRIMES, Centre de recherche en aménagement et en développement (CRAD), Université Laval, Québec, Canada Workshop on ICT, Innovation and the Transport System STELLA – STAR – NSF 17 January 2002 Arlington, Va., USA

2. Sponsorship 3 year programme: Human behaviour and GIS-based environmentally sustainable land-use and transportation modelling GEOIDE, the Network of Centres of Excellence in Geomatics(headquartered at Laval University) + Transport Canada 5 year programme: Access to Activities and Services in Urban Canada: Behavioural Processes that Condition Equity and Sustainability Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (Major Collaborative Research Initiatives, 2000 –2005) + Quebec Ministry of Transport

3. Co-investigators • UNIVERSITÉ LAVAL: Denis Bolduc (Econometrics), François DesRosiers (Business/Land Economics), Martin Lee-Gosselin (Transport planning), Marius Thériault (GIS/Data modelling/ Geography) and Paul-Yvon Villeneuve (Urban models/Geography) • UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO: Eric Miller (Modelling/Civil Engineering) • McMASTER UNIVERSITY: Pavlos Kanaroglou (Modelling/Geography) • UNIVERSITÉ DU QUÉBEC/INRS-URBANISATION: Anne-Marie Séguin (Urban Geography) • UNIV. OF CALGARY: John Douglas Hunt (Modelling/Civil Engineering/Architecture) • WILFRID LAURIER UNIVERSITY: Sean Doherty (Geography/Activity data methods and modelling) • UNIVERSITÉ DE MONTRÉAL: Danielle Marceau (GIS/Data modelling/Geography) • McGILL UNIVERSITY: Murtaza Haider (Land Economics, Engineering, Planning)

4. This is about: • The sustainability policycontext of our research (we are trying improve the behavioural foundations of models for Canadian urban regions) • The modellingcontext: Integrated Land-Use, Transport and Environmental impact (ILUTE) models and their “inconvenient” needs for data on activity and travel • A “non-techy” look at the growing contribution of ICT-aided survey methods • Some challenges

5. The sustainability policy context • Widespread recognition that existing policy simulation in transport is short-term, too focussed on the work trip and oversimplifies evolving land-use • The environmental, safety and security consequences of the land-use/ transport/communications system are powerful, if fluctuating, “hot” issues • Post-modern behaviour is inconvenient for stable policy

6. The modelling context • We are interested in the dynamics of urban land-use/transport/ICT interactions over a 10-20 year horizon, and the range of potential impacts on the environment and human health • We are working towards an integrated model suite that will simulate the interactions between urban actors and estimate the collective consequences of their individual decisions under alternative policy and technology scenarios. Sensitivity to those scenarios is more important than specific travel demand forecasts • Our ambition is to build much of the model suite around micro-behavioural decisions made at the household level.

7. Integrated Land-use, Transportation and Environment model ACCIDENTS

8. Five “inconvenient” issues in travel behaviour modelling • Travel behaviour is a lot more than modal choice for the work commute: it involves a whole range of spatio-temporal adaptations – the “democratisation” of ICT is playing an increasing role in these • Equilibrium vs. the “just-in-time” life: a tension between countervailing desires: predictability and spontaneity • “Preference” and “choice”: we need to know about freedom to act • People sometimes change a lot of things at once: an increasing need to observe linkages • What people do doesn’t tell you much about why they do it and when they might change

9. Beyond observing trips • A new generation of powerful, computerised tools promises much for the micro-modelling of vehicle duty cycles and traffic, but what about trip patterns? • Observing outcomes (trips) is not enough • Shifts in data collection over recent decades : household trips (static view) ê household activities (derived demand view) ê household decision processes (dynamic/evolving lifestyles view)

10. Balancing the spatial and temporal dimensions Classification proposed by Ramadier, 2000

11. History of ICT as part of thetoolkit for surveying individual behaviour(NB: in addition to data capture from ATT/ITS and e-commerce transations) • 1970 - 1990: analogue, aspatial vehicle monitoring (high cost, customised) • Early 1990s: digital aspatial vehicle-based data loggers • Mid 1990s: use of data logger data and GIS • Mid to late 1990s: DGPS/GPS-aided vehicle-based travel diaries + prototype person-based “shoulder-bag” GPS-aided diaries • Early 2000s: a variety of GPS-aided and triangulation techniques under development for vehicle-based and person-based surveys

12. Opportunities offered by mobile positioning technologies • Detail we could never expect people to write down or tell us, including: • micro space-time (tiny trips, speed, etc.) • route choice • precision of data for merging (GIS layers,etc) • Extension of the period of observation

13. Three main ways positioning technologies have been used for travel surveys • Imitating traditional travel diaries • Passive monitoring • Hybrid approaches

14. 1. Imitating traditional diaries • Generally requires interface at each trip end and a “store until unit returned” design philosophy • Example: Lexington experiment (Murakami et al) • Key issue is, of course, data reduction in GIS • Perhaps the best “imitation” use of GPS is for a high quality layer, not as a substitute for traditional telephone, postal and interview methods

15. 2. Passive monitoring • Until now almost entirely vehicle based, often with telemetry • Has benefitted from much development of fleet logistics software • Example: NHTSA/Ga Tech’s 1200 vehicle crash monitoring study (Ogle, Guensler et al) – has accelerometer and INS validation of geolocations – 12 month+ observation period with transmission of exposure (vehicle trips) • Many shorter-term applications possible

16. 3. Hybrid approaches • Passive monitoring + fill in the detail through interim contacts with the respondent • Especially, but not exclusively, useful for episodic surveys (e.g. long-distance travel) • LD example: INRETS (F) use of FM triangulation combined with questionnaire • Household mobility example: in a panel survey, our Canadian consortium is surveying the decision “history” of activity organisation over 7 days, and in parallel tracking vehicles (later people) with GPS. Processed GPS-GIS data is summarised and used in follow-up interviews. • We have also prototyped a daily phone “fill-in” of rapidly processed GPS data on activity stops.

17. Arrêt de 6 min Arrêts de 3 et 6 min

18. Challenges • The abundance of data means automated processing: danger that some of the most interesting opportunities, such as studying interdependencies within a household, may be ignored in favour of traditional parameters • Keep in mind that the impact of ICT is part of the evolution of spatio-temporal behaviour: • day-to-day organisation and scheduling • important potential to affect the division of labour within households • changes in social networks, especially teenagers but increasingly the young retirees • major concern about social exclusion and the ICT-poor

19. Challenges (cont) • ICT from a survey design perspective • problem of artifacts of survey technologies (e.g. a respondent gets a cell phone for the first time as part of instrument package) • bigger problem of influencing cognition through the organisation and representation of information on a Rs spatio-temporal behaviour (often ignored, should be part of “reflexive” designs) • Collecting data on decision processes underlying spatio-temporal activity patterns (for use in models) means supporting new kinds of classification • we have made good progress on planning horizon, as suggested by Gärling and others (e.g. CHASE type CASI methods • but we have only just started to deal with the level of vulnerability to replanning that ICT facilitates

20. Challenges (cont) • Interesting opportunities for real-world experiments using mass-market ICT • PDA scheduling aids with varying levels of access to external sources • Personal Area Networks (even BANs) may transform the potential for concepts such as value pricing and emissions trading…….. • BUT, we should first do well what is now poorly done: get fundamental data on spatio-temporal behaviour so we can tackle sustainability and equity in “mainstream” planning tools. • In a more general sense, and faced with increasing sample selection concerns, we are under-using multi-method designs, especially incorporating ICT-aided methods (including indirect data capture).

21. Thank youMerci