The Effects of Life Course Events on Car Ownership and Sustainable Mobility Tools Adoption Decisions: Results of an Error Component Random Parameter Logit Model

Gaofeng Gu, Tao Feng, Chixing Zhong, Xiaoxi Cai and Jiang Li
Additional contact information
Gaofeng Gu: Department of the Build Environment, Eindhoven University of Technology, 5600 MB Eindhoven, The Netherlands
Tao Feng: Department of the Build Environment, Eindhoven University of Technology, 5600 MB Eindhoven, The Netherlands
Chixing Zhong: School of Architecture, Hunan University, Changsha 410082, China
Xiaoxi Cai: College of Fine Arts and Design, Hunan First Normal University, Changsha 410205, China
Jiang Li: School of Architecture and Art, Central South University, Changsha 410083, China

Sustainability, 2021, vol. 13, issue 12, 1-21

Abstract: Life course events can change household travel demand dramatically. Recent studies of car ownership have examined the impacts of life course events on the purchasing, replacing, and disposing of cars. However, with the increasing diversification of mobility tools, changing the fleet size is not the only option to adapt to the change caused by life course events. People have various options with the development of sustainable mobility tools including electric car, electric bike, and car sharing. In order to determine the impacts of life course events on car ownership and the decision of mobility tool type, a stated choice experiment was conducted. The experiment also investigated how the attributes of mobility tools related to the acceptance of them. Based on existing literature, we identified the attributes of mobility tools and several life course events which are considered to be influential in car ownership decision and new types of mobility tools choice. The error component random parameter logit model was estimated. The heterogeneity across people on current car and specific mobility tools are considered. The results indicate people incline not to sell their current car when they choose an electric bike or shared car. Regarding the life course events, baby birth increases the probability to purchase an additional car, while it decreases the probability to purchase an electric bike or joining a car sharing scheme. Moreover, the estimation of error components implies that there is unobserved heterogeneity across respondents on the sustainable mobility tools choice and the decision on household’s current car.

Keywords: life course events; car ownership; error component model; electric car; car sharing (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/12/6816/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/12/6816/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:12:p:6816-:d:576076

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().