The Positive Utility of the Commute: Modeling Ideal Commute Time and Relative Desired Commute Amount

Lothlorien S. Redmond and Patricia Mokhtarian

University of California Transportation Center, Working Papers from University of California Transportation Center

Abstract: Two measures of commute time preferences – Ideal Commute Time and Relative Desired Commute amount (a variable indicating the desire to commute “much less” to “much more” than currently) – are modeled, using tobit and ordered probit, respectively. Ideal Commute Time was found to be positively related to Actual Commute Time and to a liking and utility for commuting, and negatively related to commute frequency and to a family/community-oriented lifestyle. Relative Desired Commute, on the other hand, was negatively related to amounts of actual commute and work-related travel, but positively related to travel liking and a measure of commute benefit. Overall, commute time is not unequivocally a source of disutility to be minimized but rather offers some benefits (such as a transition between home and work). Most people have a non-zero optimum commute time, which can be violated in either direction – i.e. it is possible (although comparatively rare, occurring for only 7% of the sample) to commute too little. On the other hand, a large proportion of people (52% of the sample) are commuting longer than they would like, and hence would presumably be receptive to reducing (although usually not eliminating) that commute.

Keywords: commuting; ordered probit; tobit; travel behavior; Social and Behavioral Sciences (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2001-01-01
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (132)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/4mc291p2.pdf;origin=repeccitec (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: The positive utility of the commute: modeling ideal commute time and relative desired commute amount (2001)
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:cdl:uctcwp:qt4mc291p2

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in University of California Transportation Center, Working Papers from University of California Transportation Center Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Lisa Schiff ().