Index of Satisfaction with Public Transport: A Fuzzy Clustering Approach

Paula Vicente, Abdul Suleman and Elizabeth Reis
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Paula Vicente: Business Research Unit (BRU-IUL), Department of Quantitative Methods for Management and Economics, Instituto Universitário de Lisboa (ISCTE-IUL), 1649-026 Lisboa, Portugal
Abdul Suleman: Business Research Unit (BRU-IUL), Department of Mathematics, Instituto Universitário de Lisboa (ISCTE-IUL), 1649-026 Lisboa, Portugal
Elizabeth Reis: Business Research Unit (BRU-IUL), Department of Quantitative Methods for Management and Economics, Instituto Universitário de Lisboa (ISCTE-IUL), 1649-026 Lisboa, Portugal

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 22, 1-19

Abstract: Increasing public transport use is recognized by many countries as crucial to the pursuit of a global strategy for environmental sustainability and improving urban mobility. Understanding what users value in a public transport service is essential to carry out this strategy. Using fuzzy clustering, we developed an index that measures individual user satisfaction with the public transport service in the metropolitan area of Lisbon and subsequently identified the possible determinants of satisfaction by means of a regression tree model. The results achieved unveil a hierarchical partition of the data, highlighting the diversified level of satisfaction among public transport users that is reflected in the distribution of the index. The managerial implications of the findings for the public transport service are addressed.

Keywords: fuzzy clustering; public transport; regression trees; service quality attributes (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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