On the Asymmetric User Perception of Transit Service Quality

Abstract

ABSTRACT In this article, heterogeneity of transit users in perceiving service quality is investigated. Users' perceptions of transit services are heterogeneous for many reasons: the qualitative nature of some service aspects, the different users' socioeconomic characteristics, the diversity in tastes and attitudes towards transit. In this research, heterogeneity is treated through a mixed logit model with a non-parametric distribution of the coefficients, allowing the asymmetry in user perception heterogeneity to be considered. Although the results presented apply to the specific population in the sample, represented by university students, the proposed methodology is general and transferable to other case studies. Key Words: asymmetry in users' perceptionsmixed logit modelsservice qualitytransitusers' heterogeneity ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The authors would like to thank the four anonymous reviewers, whose comments helped to improve this article. Notes Note. m = mean; s.d. = standard deviation; P0, P1, P2, …, P6 = spline supporting points.