Transportation 19: 117-139, 1992 9 1992KluwerAcademic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.

High speed rail market projection: Survey design and analysis

H. E GUNN 1, M. A. BRADLEY2 & D. A. HENSHER 3
1, 2 Hague Consulting Group, Den Haag, The Netherlands; 3 Institute of Transport Studies, The University of Sydney, NSW, Australia

Key words: high speed rail, survey, demandforecasting,stated preferences

Abstract. This paper summarises work done to assess the market potential and likely financial performance of a planned high-speed rail link connecting Sydney, Canberra and Melbourne, under a variety of scenarios concerning the services offered and the possible market responses of the competing transport modes in the corridor. In the Australian context, such a link has the characteristics of an essentially new transport mode since existing rail services are extremely poorly developed. The expectation was that generated demand could be a substantial part of the overall ridership. A programme of market research was commissioned by the private consortium considering the project, designed to support forecasting models capable of predicting both diverted and generated travel on the new service. A major survey of current travellers was conducted in 1988, followed by an extensive collection of stated preference evidence about the factors affecting the travel decisions of both existing travellers and those who had not recently made any journeys in the corridor. The paper focuses mainly on the design and organisation of the surveys, on the analysis approach, and on the methods used to generate forecasts for simulated populations and scenarios.

1. Introduction

The interest in developing new high-speed rail systems has grown substantially in recent years as technology becomes available to make the objectives of such a system feasible. In very general terms, these objectives are to provide much of the speed and luxury of air travel while also providing the frequency, reliability and convenience of access and egress which is possible with rail travel. A crucial question is whether such a service can be provided at price levels which are attractive to passengers and still provide net revenues which are attractive to investors. As service levels, prices, passenger revenues and operating costs are strongly interdependent, one needs to be able to simulate the passenger market in order to answer this question. This paper describes such a market research study for the proposed VFT (Very Fast Train) system in Australia. In general terms, two types of information are necessary to predict demand for a new transport mode: 9 A detailed understanding of the travel market without the new alternative, in terms of:

118 -

the different sub-markets which are relevant (in terms of origin/destination, travel purpose, etc.); the number of travellers in each of these sub-markets; the travel alternatives available to them; their criteria for choosing between those alternatives; and the expected changes over time in the size of the sub-markets and the characteristics of the travel alternatives.

A means of understanding the changes in each sub-market which will result from the introduction of the new alternative, in terms of: the diversion of travellers from existing alternatives; - the generation of additional travellers resulting from improved travel opportunities; and the sensitivity of diverted and generated travel to the characteristics of the new system and to exogenous factors.

Most travel studies tend to focus on developing only one of these two types of information: either the first by means of observing actual travel choices (revealed preferences), or the second by means of eliciting travel choices under hypothetical situations (stated preferences). The study described here was required to provide all of the types of information listed above, and thus provides a rather unique example of the integration of different transport demand survey and analysis techniques. This paper is organised as follows: Section 2 provides a background to the VFT study and its objectives. Section 3 describes the research into the existing travel market, designed around intercept surveys of car, air, coach and rail travellers. Section 4 describes the research related directly to the proposed VFT system, designed around face-to-face surveys of both travellers and non-travellers. Section 5 describes how the information was combined to provide passenger and revenue forecasts over time. Finally, brief conclusions are given in Section 6. In all of these sections, the major focus will be on the research methods rather than on the numerical results. Additional information on the study can be found in Hensher et al. (1989) and Gunn et al. (1990).

2.

Background

to

the

study

The proposed rail system

The VFT (Very Fast Train) is a proposed new high-speed rail system connecting the cities of Sydney, Canberra and Melbourne in south-eastern Australia. It is proposed that the system will reach speeds of 350 kilometers per hour, connecting Australia's two largest cities with a travel time of

119 3 hours. The system would be electrically powered, using technology similar to that used for the successful high-speed raft systems operating in Japan and France. The VFT system, if it goes ahead, will be financed by a joint venture of private corporations. Forecasts of passenger revenues are, therefore, crucial in deciding whether the project is financially attractive. As a number of state and federal government agencies must also approve the project, forecasts of economic, social and environmental impacts are also necessary. A major feasibility study was thus undertaken, including several different tasks to study these various issues. The work reported here was part of the Passenger Market Study completed in August 1988. When the feasibility study is completed, a decision can be made whether or not to begin construction toward the proposed start of operation in 1995.

The passenger market study

The study responsible for forecasting passenger demand for the VFT was coordinated by CSIRO and the Transport Research Centre (TRC) of Macquarie University. The Transport Research Centre was responsible for the overall design and conduct of the data collection and expansion. Three separate consultants were contracted to use this data to provide independent forecasts of passenger demand: Japan Railway Technical Service (JARTS), SOFRERAIL of France, and a joint team of Hague Consulting Group (HCG) and Cambridge Systematics, Inc. (CSI). The three consulting teams followed somewhat different forecasting approaches. In this paper, we describe the I-ICG/CSI approach which provided the central forecasts for the study. The basic steps in the overall forecasting approach were: (1) Analysis of observed travel patterns in the VFT corridor (revealed preferences) to identify the major factors revealed as affecting the choice of travel mode, and indicate subgroups of travellers who react differently to these factors. (2) Production of a market growth model to predict total trip making in the VFT corridor in future years, relative to observed travel patterns. (3) Analysis of stated preferences among various hypothetical travel options (including the VFT) to establish factors affecting the diversion of travel from competing modes and the generation of new travel, and to indicate the perceived value of optional extras such as restaurant facilities and car-hire packages. (4) Reconciliation of the analyses based on revealed and stated preferences to produce a model consistent with both types of evidence.

120 (5) Assembly of a forecasting module, consisting of software designed to apply these various trip generation and mode choice models in a consistent manner, and thereby to deduce passenger demand for the VFT service. (6) Production of forecasts using a variety of assumptions about pricing, travel times, and so on, to generate a series of central forecasts for specified future years and to indicate the sensitivities of these forecasts to variations in key assumptions. CSI was responsible for the analysis in steps 1 and 2, while HCG was responsible for the remaining analysis (steps 3 and 4) and the forecasting (steps 5 and 6). These various steps are discussed, along with the necessary data collection, in the following sections.

3.

Research

into the existing travel market

D e f i n i t i o n o f the V F T c o r r i d o r a n d zonal data The z o n e s y s t e m

The spatial framework for a study of this type is, of course, the zone system adopted. In this study, the zone system and the corresponding databases were created by the Transport Research Centre. The three considerations of most importance in defining the zone system were: -

the potential for providing passengers to the VFT, the availability of demographic and network data, and the compatibility with other zone-based studies, such as the National Travel Survey.

The main source of demographic data was determined to be the local government areas (LGAs) used in the 1986 census. These areas are also used for a number of other studies. As to the relevance of areas to the VFT system, three different levels of aggregation were used:
M e t r o p o l i t a n zones: In Sydney and Melbourne, expected to provide the

majority of passengers, each LGA was defined as a separate zone giving 44 and 55 zones, respectively. O t h e r z o n e s in the corridor: For other regions in the VFT corridor, LGAs were aggregated together into areas which, roughly speaking, form catchment areas for the proposed VFT stations - with no more than 1 station in a zone. This gave 3 zones in the Canberra area, 13 in the rest of New South Wales and 15 in the rest of Victoria. Z o n e s outside the corridor: The rest of Australia was broken into 7 zones,

121 generally following state boundaries, with the level of aggregation increasing with distance from the VFT corridor. The system thus contained a total of 137 different zones.

Demographic data
In order to be able to predict changes in the size of the travel market and in the profile of the travelling population over time, we needed to know the profile of residence and employment in each zone - both for the base year and for all forecast years. Very detailed information was available for the base year (1987), mainly from the Census data. The number of residents and households in each zone could be broken down by age, employment status, income and household size. Total employment in each zone could be broken down into various types. For the forecast years (1995, 2000, 2005 and 2010), such detailed predictions were often not available. In such cases, more aggregate predictions of overall growth rates had to be applied.

Level of service data

Also needed for estimating and applying models of mode choice are zoneto-zone level of service measures for each mode - again for both the base year and all forecast years. Levels of service were specified for journeys between all zone pairs with at least one "trip end" in the VFT corridor. The service measures included linehaul times and costs and access/egress times and costs for air, train, coach, car, and (for future years) the proposed VFT system. These measures were created using three levels of network data: -

detailed metropolitan networks for Sydney and Melbourne; a regional linehaul network for the rest of Australia; and intra-regional connections to the linehaul network.

A number of different sources were used to compile these networks, including road maps and air and public transport fare schedules and timetables.

Intercept surveys of current travellers Purpose of the surveys

Extensive surveys of current trips in the VFT corridor were required for three different purposes: -

for expansion, to provide base year origin-destination trip matrices for each mode and purpose; for modelling, to estimate the importance of various factors on the mode choice of travellers for each purpose; and

122 for forecasting, to provide a "prototypical" sample of travellers for different years and scenarios (see Section 5).

In general, the creation of expanded trip matrices was the most important consideration for sampling strategy, while modelling and forecasting issues were more important for questionnaire design.

Questionnaire design
The emphasis of the intercept survey was to collect objective data on the one-way trip which the respondent was making at that time - by car, air, coach or rail. For expansion, the essential data were: The origin and destination of the trip; The main purpose of the trip (outward and return); and The size and composition of the travelling party.

For modelling and forecasting purposes, a number of additional items were asked:
-

Duration of stay away from home; Type of accommodation, if away from home; Access and egress mode to the terminal (for air, rail or coach); Type of fare paid (for air, rail or coach); Who paid for the trip (for air, rail or coach); Ability to use other modes for the same journey; Presence of stopovers, caravan or roof luggage (for car trips); Whether the trip was with a tour or organised party; The annual number of trips made between that same O-D pair; Socio-economic characteristics of the respondent (age, sex, occupation, drivers licence); Socio-economic characteristics of the respondent's household (size and composition, car ownership, income); and Home address.

The questionnaire for car travellers was somewhat different than for the other modes. This was necessary, among other reasons, because only one respondent per car was interviewed, whereas each adult passenger was interviewed on air, rail and coach. For air travel, a Japanese translation of the questionnaire was prepared.

Sampling strategy
The main objective in sampling was to produce origin-destination trip matrices which were as accurate as possible within the number of surveys which budget would allow. Thus, only the major potential markets were surveyed:

123 car, scheduled air, scheduled coach and train journeys, with at least one end within the VFT corridor. It was recognised at the outset that certain markets with less potential had to be omitted: charter air, private air, charter coach and journeys with both ends outside the corridor but which may pass through the corridor. As a result, the trip matrices which eventually resulted were viewed as somewhat conservative estimates, recognising the possibility of including these additional markets in further studies. Given some initial idea of the number and distribution of trips in the corridor from passenger statistics and traffic counts, the intercept surveys were scheduled to provide a fairly comprehensive distribution of surveys across all routes and across all times of day and week. Due to the limited time scale for data collection, seasonality effects were left to be considered in the expansion procedure.

Survey administration The surveys were administered during November and early December 1987 over a seven day period at each site. In processing the data, various rules were used to fill a missing question data where possible. The final data base consisted of 29,982 trips, with the distribution across modes shown below. The overall response rate was roughly 72%. The highest response rate was for car and the lowest was for train (see Table 1).
Table 1. Summary of survey sample size.

Mode Air Car Coach Train TOTAL

Distributed 25,260 8,666 4,296 3,578 41,800

Effective sample 16,166 8,232 3,437 2,147 29,982

Response rate 64% 95% 80% 60% 72%

Analysis based on the intercept surveys Estimation of trip matrices The sampling strategy used for the intercept surveys allowed fairly straightforward expansion of the surveys to provide estimates of the number of trips going in each direction between each relevant pair of zones, based on the sampling rates adopted and the response rates achieved. Weekly numbers of trips were obtained directly and, with some assumptions regarding seasonality, these could be converted to yearly trip totals. The trips were divided by purpose and type to give six final production-

124 attraction matrices for each mode: (1) home-based business trips; (2) homebased visits to friends and relatives; (3) home-based "other" (mostly holiday and recreation); and (4-6) non-home-based trips for the same three purpose groups. This division was made primarily to accommodate purpose-specific models in the forecasting stage. The results of the expansion were of much interest as they were the most accurate picture ever provided of travel in the Sydney-Canberra-Melbourne corridor. The overall results were in line with previous evidence, but with a higher number of short-distance car trips in the corridor than had been expected. The market growth model For forecasting, it was necessary to predict how the number of trips between each zone pair for each purpose would change between the base year and each forecast year. In order to do this, we assumed that both the production and attraction of trips would be proportional to either the population or the employment in a given zone. The factors which were used for each purpose were, as presented in Table 2. Table 2. Definitionof productionand attraction dimensionsfor determination of market growth. Purpose (1) Home-based,business (2) Home-based,visit (3) Home-based,other (4) Non-home-based,business (5) Non-home-based, visit (6) Non-home-based, other Production factor Population Population Population Employment Population Population Attraction factor Employment Population Population Employment Population Population

These factors were based on the predicted changes in population, or employment between 1987 and a given forecast year within a given zone or group of zones. For "population", the factor was a combination of growth in the number of people and the number of households. For the zones representing smaller towns and cities in the VFT corridor, the predicted growth rates were increased somewhat to represent, in a very approximate sense, the economic growth which would be generated by the construction and presence of the VFT system. Note that the production and attraction factors apply to the margins of the trips matrices, while the trips themselves are cells in the matrices. In order to find the amount of growth in the individual cells which, when summed, simultaneously matched the growth along both the production and attraction margins, the method of iterative proportional fitting (IPF) was used.

125 At this point, the growth in travel was assumed to be independent of mode. Thus, we produced six new trip matrices for each forecast year, with trips added across car, air, coach and rail. In forecasting, mode choice models can then be used to redistribute the trips across these modes.

Models of mode choice

Separate multinomial logit models of mode choice were estimated for business and non-business trips. As one would expect, the main explanatory variables for these models were the travel time and cost for the main modes - car, air, rail and coach. Other important factors were the time and cost of access and egress modes, the travel party size, the duration of stay at the destination, and the age and income of the traveller. Overall, as one often finds, these choice models based on revealed preference data were less precise and less comprehensive than the similar models based on stated preference data which are described below.

4. Research into the demand for high speed rail

Face-to-face surveys of potential passengers Purpose of the survey

In order to predict usage of the VFT system, it was necessary to contact potential passengers directly, using a face-to-face survey instrument. The most important functions of this survey were: -

To To To To

provide provide provide provide

data data data data

to to to to

estimate diversion of trips to the VFT, estimate trip generation due to the VFT, indicate service preferences for the VFT, study seasonality of travel in the corridor.

To provide all of these types of information, it was clear that a fairly lengthy survey in a face-to-face setting would be most appropriate, and that a large sample would be required, particularly, when compared to a "typical" stated preference study.

Questionnaire design
The face-to-face survey questionnaire was designed to include five main sections:

(1) A section for the respondent to summarise all of the long-distance trips
they made in the VFT corridor in the preceding year (indicating for each the mode, origin, destination, purpose, route, month, and travel party size).

126 (2) A stated choice experiment in which the respondent was asked to choose from all relevant travel modes, including the VFT, in the context of a specific trip but with systematic changes in the times and costs of the modes. (3) A section focussing on suppressed trips which the respondent would have liked to make but did not, their reasons for not making such trips, and their stated intentions of making these trips or other additional trips if the VFT were to become available. (4) Attitudinal questions concerning possible service features for the VFT, such as package deals, location of stations, ticketing arrangements, etc. This section also included a second stated choice experiment trading off among a subset of these features. (5) Questions to obtain a socio-economic and demographic profile of the respondent and their household. Sections 2 and 3 were particularly important for forecasting, and deserve to be discussed in more detail.

The mode choice experiment

The stated mode choice experiment was probably one of the most ambitious SP experiments ever carried out in transport research. The experiment involved several steps:
-

From Section 1 of the survey, a recent trip was chosen as the context for the experiment. If the respondent had not travelled recently in the corridor, they were asked to describe their most likely such journey. The respondent was shown a realistic brochure describing the VFT service, including a route map, a timetable, a picture of the train, and a description of some service features. The respondent was asked to describe the time and cost for them to access the nearest airport and the nearest coach and rail stations. The same was done for egress at the destination. This information was recorded on a specially designed form, shown in Fig. 1. The interviewer selected a set of 16 cards. Each card had a different combination of travel time and cost for the five modes (car, air, rail, coach and VFT), with the combinations specified using an appropriate orthogonal design. There were 14 such sets of cards, with the time and cost levels differing according to the distance of the journey (7 classes) and the level of fare paid (2 classes - business or non-business). One such card is shown in Fig. 2. The interviewer presented one of the 16 cards at random. The access and egress times and costs which had been calculated (step 3 above) were added on the card by the interviewer for each mode (except car) to

127 arrive at the total times and the total costs for the travelling party. The respondent was then asked to choose which of the five modes they would select for that journey if they were available with those times and costs. This procedure was repeated for 3 additional cards from the 16, also selected at random. Due to the fairly complex and time-consuming nature of each choice task, only 4 of the relevant 16 choice sets were given to each respondent. This procedure is appropriate as long as the responses are analysed across groups of respondents, but does require that the sample size be quite large. Note that such a complex, customised face-to-face experiment would be an ideal situation for the use of microcomputer-administered interviewing which is becoming quite common. The computer would eliminate the need for the interviewer to do so much selection of cards and calculation of times of costs. Given the large number of respondents and locations which needed to be covered in a limited amount of time, however, it was decided that the cost of such a method would be prohibitive. Such an approach would become feasible in the near future, however, as computers and interview software improve and become less expensive. Also note that the actual times and costs used in the experiment were not strictly of relevance as long as they were within a range which seemed realistic to the respondent. The aim of the experiment was to provide the data necessary to model the preference for the VFT relative to the other modes as a function of the importance placed on each of the travel attributes - and thus the market share diverted to the VFT under specific time and cost scenarios.

Questions regarding induced demand It was recognised from the outset that the VFT in itself may induce additional trips, and thus raise the total level of travel in the corridor. Experience with the introduction of high-speed rail in France and Japan indicates that such induced travel may be as high as 30% of the total traffic. In the context of this study, "induced" travel not only includes the generation of new trips, but also the redistribution of trips from destinations outside the corridor to those within the corridor (although the latter seems unlikely for purposes such as business or visiting friends and relatives). Four questions were central to the analysis of induced demand: 1. Are there any trips in the corridor [map] which you would like to make, but for reasons connected with the difficulty of travel, you or other members of the household do not make? [If not, go to (3)] 2. Why don't you~they travel there by car/train~coach~plane? [Asked for each mode, with a list of possible reasons supplied.]

128

L Trip TO Station]Airport/Terminal
a. HOW DID/WOULD YOUTRAVELTO THE AIRPORT/STATION/TERMINAL? Car - dropped off Car - parked Car - rental Taxi (COO) (go to c) (CPK) (go to c) (CRT) (TX) (go to c) Train (TRN) (go to c) Bus (BUS) (go to c) Plane (PLN) (go to c) Other (Specify) (go to c) ( ...... rains) ( .... mins mins rains .... mins) mins rains mins COACH/VFT/TBAIN PLANE

b. HOW LONG DID/WOULD IT TAKE TO HAND IN YOUR CAR? c. HOW LONG DID/WOULD IT TAKE UNTIL YOU GOT INSIDE THE STATION/AIRPORT/TERMINALFROM d. HOW LONG DID/WOULD IT TAKE TO HAND IN YOUR LUGGAGEAND CHECK IN? e. HOW LONG DID/WOULD YOU HAVE TO WAIT BEFORE GETTING ON BOARD? f. Total time (c + d + e) g. HOW MUCH DID/WOULD IT COST TO TRAVEL TO THE AIRPORT/ STATION/TERMINAL (INCLUDING PARKING AT THE AIRPORT/ STATION/TERMINAL) (Assume 5r for private cars and 7r for company cars.) REMEMBERTO INCLUDECOSTSOFALL PEOPLEPAID FOR BYYOU OR YOUR BUSINESS.

o,os]l

o, ,I

iL Trip FROM the Station]Airport/Terminal

h, HOW LONG DID/WOULD IT TAKE YOU TO COLLECT YOUR LUGGAGE AND DEPART FROM THE AIRPORT/STATION/TERMINAL(including picking up your car)? i. HOW DID/WOULD YOU TRAVEL FROM THE AIRPORT/STATION/ TERMINAL TO YOUR DESTINATION? Car - met Car - parked Car - rental Taxi (CCL) (go to k) (CPK) (go to k) (CRT) (TX) (go to k) Train (TRN) (go to k) Bus (BUS) (go to k) Plane (PLN) (go to k) Other (Specify) (go to k) ( ..... mins) rains mins) rains ..... mins rains mins mins

j. HOW LONG DID/WOULD IT TAKE YOU TO RENT THE CAR? I~ HOW LONG DID/WOULD IT TAKE YOU TO GET FROM THE AIRPORT/ STATION/TERMINALTO YOUR DESTINATION? t. Total time (h + k) m. HOW MUCH DID/WOULD IT COST TO GET FROM THE AIRPORT/ STATION/TERMINAL TO YOUR DESTINATION (INCLUDING PARKING ATTHE AIRPORT/STATION/TERMINALANDCAR RENTAL CHARGES)? (Assume 5r for private cars and 7r for company cars.) (REMEMBER TO INCLUDE COSTS OF ALL PEOPLE PAID FOR BY YOU OR YOUR BUSINESS)

[ .....

'n,I

iii. Total Access Plus Egress Time (f + I)

iv. Total Access Plus Egress Cost (g + m)

(Interviewer: Transcribe Items iii and iv to Showcards when you have completed both columns)

Fig. 1. Face-to-face interview access/egress summary.

Fig. 2. Face-to-face interview mode choice SP card.

130

For whatever reason, do you think your household's travel might increase in the Sydney-Canberra-Melbourne corridor if the VFT is available? 4. Could you estimate the possible increase in travel between the following places for both business and non-business purposes ? [Asked for each destination and purpose.] The respondent was also asked to distinguish between trips which would be made on a regular basis, and those which would only be made once for the novelty value of the new service.
The first two questions were designed to identify the presence of latent or suppressed demand and the possible constraints on travel by the existing modes in the VFT corridor. The reasons include the non-availability of a mode, excessive travel time or cost, inconvenience, discomfort, or lack of safety. The last two questions are designed to provide an estimate of the possible increase in travel between key cities and regions for both business and non-business purposes if the VFT were introduced. We will return to this analysis below.

3.

Sampling strategy The most up-to-date and convenient basis for selecting the sample for the faceto-face surveys was the intercept survey sample, for many of whom names and addresses were known. A random subsample was drawn from the intercept sample, with stratification by residence area in order to ensure geographic coverage of a number of major and minor population centres in the corridor. Nine such centres were selected in addition to the three main cities. Stratification was also made on travel mode and purpose of the intercepted trip. It was recognised that the intercept sample would be biased somewhat towards those who most frequently make long trips in the corridor, and that it would also be important to interview those who travel less frequently, as such people may be an important source of new induced travel. Based on an estimate of the percentage of the population which would not have travelled in the corridor during the previous 12 months, it was decided that an additional 20% of the sample should be contacted completely at random - thus, not selected from the intercept survey. Survey administration The fieldwork began in mid-December and ran until the first week of March, 1988. In total, 2116 effective interviews were completed, an overall response rate of 55% of letters mailed out for participation and 85% of those answering the letter. With a complex interview, lasting from 35 to 55 minutes, the large number completed was a substantial achievement (Table 3). An International tourist survey was also carried out using a shortened version of the questionnaire. This included roughly 200 interviews at Sydney

131
Table 3. Summary of response rates for face-to-face survey. Sample Segment Car-Non-business Air-business Train Air-Non-business Car-Business Coach Intercept Size % VFT 859 1221 305 213 250 187 32% 53% 61% 68% 54% 74% Random Size 1409 192 373 199 145 204 Total Size 2268 1413 678 412 395 391

% VFT 38% 69% 71% 72% 54% 67%

% VFT 36% 56% 66% 70% 54% 70%

airport and 100 at Melbourne airport, including respondents from a wide variety of countries.

Analysis of travel diverted to the VFT

The major source of passenger demand for the VFT was expected to be the diversion of trips away from the existing travel modes in the corridor - car, air, coach and train. In order to predict the extent to which travellers would switch to the proposed new alternative, a mode choice analysis was conducted on the face-to-face stated choice data. In developing a modelling strategy, we expected travel times and costs - including access, main and egress modes - to be the main factors determining choices between the modes. In addition, we expected possible influences from person/household characteristics such as income, age and car ownership, and from journey characteristics such as distance, duration of stay, purpose and party size. We also expected that the origin and destination area (i.e. city versus corridor) might influence mode choice-capturing access/egress/convenience effects not fully reflected in the times and costs of the alternatives. Logit discrete-choice estimation was used to model the influences of these various factors on the probability of switching to the VFT. One of the key considerations in logit modelling is that the sample used for each model be as homogeneous as possible. For example, one should attempt to segment the sample to isolate groups which are expected to be very cost-sensitive from those who are predominantly time-sensitive. In this study, we expected the current travel mode to be a strong indicator of relative time/cost sensitivity, with those using air tending to be most time-sensitive, and those using coach or rail tending to be least so. We would also expect many of the unmeasured circumstances surrounding the journeys (need to carry heavy baggage, need for flexibility in travel times, etc.) to be different between those who actually chose different modes. Therefore, after initial model estimation tests on the

132 full sample, we segmented the sample according to the mode actually used for the journey. The proportion of respondents preferring the VFT varies quite significantly by segment. Prior to modelling, however, it was not possible to say whether such differences were due to differences in the tastes of the travellers, or simply to the different times and costs of the competing modes. It may be possible that the intercept-based sample is biased in certain respects as opposed to the random sample for each mode/purpose. Specifically, the intercept may tend to capture more frequent travellers, who might exhibit a greater "loyalty" to the existing mode. In fact, in the previous table we see that the intercept respondents are generally somewhat less willing to switch to the VFT. Therefore, we included a separate VFT-specific constant for random (non-intercept) sample respondents in each model to adjust for this difference. This constant can then be used in application if one assumes that the responses from the random sample are the more realistic long-term responses. One might, however, take the opposite view that the intercept responses are more reliable because they would tend to be more recent trips in which the respondents' constraints and circumstances were remembered more clearly. Although we will not report the complete models here, we can summarise some of the findings:
-

The estimated coefficients for time and cost are significant in all cases except for the car cost for business trips which appear least cost sensitive. Using the estimated time and cost coefficients, we could infer a monetary value of travel time changes. These values range from around $30 per hour for business travel by air and car down to $5 per hour to travel by rail. Coach travellers also have a relatively low value - $10 per hour - with non-business car and air travellers around $13 per hour. These values are similar to those from the models based on the intercept revealed preference data. The effect of increasing income is also significant, working in favour of the more expensive mode - towards VFT for car, coach and rail travellers, and against VFT for air travellers. For car non-business, people on visits and holidays and people on one-day trips are slightly more apt to switch to VFT, while those of age 35 or more are more averse to the VFT. People making trips of less than 400 km are also less willing to switch. For business car travel, those 35 years and older again are less likely to switch to VFT. Self-employed individuals are more likely to change perhaps having more freedom in their choice of travel mode. Those in

133 households with fewer than 3 cars are more apt to switch, possibly because the car will be relatively more useful at home. For air travellers, the VFT is less attractive for journeys with a short duration of stay, presumably because of more rigid time constraints. This effect was found for both business and non-business travel. First class air travellers for both purpose groups are also less apt to change to VFT. The effect of group size differs across purposes. For business, groups of 3 or more are less likely to be diverted, while the same is true for those travelling alone for non-business. For non-business, those making trips of less than 400 km are more likely to use VFT, perhaps because air trips of this distance offer a time savings which is too small to value highly. The models for coach and rail travellers show a number of similarities. The VFT appears most attractive for business travellers, and least attractive for holiday journeys. For rail, the VFT becomes more attractive with increasing duration of stay. This indicates that VFT is less competitive with short-distance rail services which would tend to be used for day trips. For both modes, the likelihood of using the VFT appears to decrease with group size, and to be a good deal lower for those of age 65 or more. For coach, the VFT is more popular for trips of less than 400 km than for longer journeys. As we had expected, those in the random sample were more likely to select the VFT, all else equal, in every model except for air non-business. The largest effect is for air business travel. Some origin- and destination-specific effects were also found, with the VFT tending to be most attractive to those travelling to and/or from the three large cities - presumably due to the higher service frequency and convenience of access.

Analysis of travel generated by VFT

The questions posed in the Face-to-Face survey were designed to elicit total induced demand, and allow a breakdown of this demand into three categories: Existing 'suppressed demand' - those trips which the population would now like to make, but for which none of the available modes offers an acceptable journey. 'Novelty' trips - a 'once and for all' effect at the inception of the service, in that many people will opt to make a trip on the new facility just for its own sake, even if they would not intend to use it on a regular basis.

134 Further possible demand - extra 'possible' trips using the VFT, additional to current travel needs, which people can imagine making. Naturally, we would not expect that every 'possible' trip would in fact be made; the constraints of time and money budgets would generally have a limiting effect on the extra travel activity this would imply. Given past experience with stated intentions techniques, it is known that in many cases they will produce an over-statement of total induced demand, perhaps not fully incorporating the constraints of available time, money and effort faced by the would-be travellers. For forecasting, we chose to focus on 'existing suppressed demand' - an intentionally conservative assumption to offset any over-statement bias arising from the study technique. It was still important, however, to analyse demand for novelty trips and possible extra trips in order to have an idea of the importance of excluding them from the forecasts. In the analysis, it was useful to stratify the sample according to the frequency of current travel, both for explanation and for reweighting to a representative population. The sample was segmented into "frequent", "regular", "infrequent", and "non-" travellers, based on self-reported travel in the corridor in the preceding 12 months. The proportion of interviewees reporting existing suppressed trips - trips they would like to have made but did not - rises from 30% for 'non-travellers' to 40% for 'frequent travellers', and is broadly proportional to existing travel frequency. The proportion reporting possible extra trips using the VFT system rises from 55% for 'non-travellers' to 70% for 'frequent travellers' and is also broadly proportional to existing travel frequency. A proportion of both those with and those without existing suppressed trips reported possible use of the VFT system; the proportion for those with existing suppressed demand is consistently higher, in keeping with the expectation that they are envisaging the use of the VFT both to satisfy that existing demand and for a range of extra 'possible' trips. We also calculated numbers of round-trips that the respondents estimated they would make due to the introduction of the VFT. These are distinguished into four categories, being 'regular business', 'regular non-business', 'novelty business' and 'novelty non-business'. As with the proportions, these results indicated that those with existing suppressed demand for travel in the corridor consistently report more future usage of the VFT than those without. The non-business purpose appears to offer a greater amount of induced travel than does business travel; presumably because in the short-term there is a better appreciation of new or suppressed opportunities for discretionary trips than for business trips.

135 Based on these results, we could calculate the total average numbers of suppressed round-trips, for each category of trip, for each travel frequency class; weighting them together according to the proportions in each frequency class in the random (non-intercept) subset of the data gives us an overall average (round-)trip rate per household for study area residents in each of main subareas of the study area (being the major cities and the corridor itself), and the resultant totals of released latent demand round-trips. The distributions across trip destinations were also calculated. Separate estimates were made for those residing outside the study area. Similar calculations were done for novelty VFT trips (made once, for curiosity) by both residents and non-residents. This source of trips indicates a substantial source of revenues, probably in the first two years of operation. For forecasting, we also needed an estimate of the sensitivity of induced demand to VFT service levels. The survey experiment depicted a facility with prices varying around two thirds that of the rival air trip. We note that the "latent" travel market was entirely suppressed when air was the only (time-acceptable) travel mode available. Ignoring quality differences between the VFT and air for these new travellers, we could assume that a 50% increase in VFT price (to levels around the corresponding air trip) would once again entirely suppress the latent market. We could expect this assumption to give conservative forecasts for scenarios when VFT prices increase, and consider it the best assumption, given the limited information available. Clearly, however, further direct experimentation would be recommended for any further investigations into induced demand. The extent of the 'wider market', the extra possible trips reported, appears to be the largest of the three types of induced demand considered. It is important to stress that we would not recommend using any of this market for current forecasts of likely ridership. Without extensive and in-depth investigation of this possible market, all that can be said with confidence is that the results over-estimate (possible grossly) the amount of new travel that would be generated. Once again, this would be an important research area in any future market investigation.

5. Forecasting the demand for the VFT

The forecasting framework

Software was created to jointly apply the results of all of the analyses described above to produce forecasts of VFT ridership and revenues on a zone-to-zone

136 (i.e. station-to-station) basis. The forecasting system was designed to run on IBM compatible microcomputers - a system which stretched the then-existing PC technology to its limits. The steps in the forecasting system were as follows: 1. For each trip production (origin) zone, a prototypical sample of travellers is expanded to be representative of all trips produced from that zone. The number of trips by each traveller to each destination for each purpose is thus a function of (1) the expansion weight for that traveller/zone, (2) the total number of trips to each destination, from the trip matrices for the forecast year, and (3) additional growth in trip rates which arises from scenario assumptions about growth rates in income and tourism growth and growth in tourism. For each combination of origin, destination, traveller, and travel purpose, the mode choice models based on revealed preferences are used to split the trips among the existing modes (car, air, coach and rail), and then the models based on the stated preference data are used to divert a share of the predicted trips from each of these modes to the VFT. Note that applying the models sequentially in this manner may give inconsistent results if large changes are introduced to the existing modes. To overcome such problems, one would have to have joint models, estimated simultaneously on the RP and SP choice observations. Techniques for such estimation, however, have only very recently come into practice. For each combination of origin, destination, and travel purpose, the additional travel induced by the VFT was added to the diverted travel, based on the stated intentions analyses. The forecasted trips, kilometerage and revenues were tabulated along a number of dimensions.

2.

3.

4.

The prototypical sample

For each zone pair, the trip matrices and network levels of service described earlier provided a basis for applying the mode choice models. However, before applying the models, we first had to distribute the trips across the 'personal factor' categories used in the models. These include age, income, journey purpose, duration of stay at the destination, and the size of the travelling party. This procedure was implemented using 'Synthetic Sample' techniques; briefly, a prototypical sample of travellers/journeys was drawn from the intercept survey data base, ranging across all traveller factor categories. Expansion weights were then derived for each combination of categories for each production zone, in such a way as to match the population distribution for each

137 zone and also maintain realistic marginal distributions for each factor in turn. This was achieved using an IPF (iterative proportional fitting) algorithm, with marginal distributions based on the intercept survey, adjusted for zone to zone variations in incomes, household sizes and population age structures. Our total sample contained 821 individuals - roughly 200 each for the purposes home-base business, home-based visit, home-based other and all nonhome-based. Within each of these purposes, we controlled not only for the characteristics mentioned above, but also for the mode actually used and for whether neither, one or both of the trip ends are in the three main cities in the corridor.

The forecast results

First, it is clear from the forecasts (Table 4) that the totaI travel market in the VFT corridor will grow substantially, even without the VFT. From 1987, we estimate a compounded annual growth in the number of trips of 3.3%. Unfortunately, perhaps, for the VFT, the highest growth is predicted to occur in trips to and from Canberra and the smaller towns in the corridor. These tend to be the shorter trips made by car. The total number of car trips is predicted to grow by almost 35% by 1995, with the number of air trips to grow by only 19%. The year 1995 was assumed as the year in which the VFT would begin operation. The table below presents the forecasts for 1995 both with and without the VFT, in units of both trips and Syd-Mels (Sydney to Melbourne kilometerage equivalents). Both forecasts were based on the Base Scenario assumptions - using the network levels of service and model coefficients as given, and assuming a 1.0% annual growth in real incomes and a 7.0% annual growth in tourism.

Table 4. Forecasts of travel in 1995 by the VFT and existing modes. 1995 MODE Car Air Coach Rail VFT-Diverted VFT-Induced TOTAL Millions of Trips No VFT With VFT 21.1 4.7 2.0 0.6 28.4 16.1 2.4 0.9 0.2 8.9 5.1 33.5 Millions of Syd-Mel's No VFT With VFT 6.1 3.6 1.4 0.3 11.4 4.5 1.9 0.7 0.1 4.1 2.5 13.9

138 The forecast is for 8.9 million VFT trips per annum - 5 million from car and over 2 million from air - with almost 4 million for business trips. To this we add 5.1 million generated VFT trips, for a total of 14 million per year. In contrast to diverted trips, the most generated trips are in the nonbusiness categories. Upon conversion to Syd-Mels, we see that diversion from air contributes more VFT passenger kilometres than diversion from car, and that a large proportion of this is business travel. In fact, the number of trips and passengerkms by air are predicted to fall below their 1987 levels. The same is true for coach and train, but not for car. As we look further into the future to 2010, use of the VFT is predicted to grow steadily - to 7.4 million Syd-Mels in 2000, 8.1 in 2005 and 9.2 in 2010. None of these results include novelty trips, which we estimated to be about 1.25 million Syd-Mels over the first two years of operation. Sensitivity testing was also undertaken for a number of important variables such as the fare for VFT and competing modes, the value of time savings, income growth, and fuel prices - some with changes as much as 20% lower and higher. These tests suggested an overall range of forecasts from 4.5 to 7.5 Syd-Mels in 1995, with travel times and cost changes having the most influence.

6. Summary and conclusions

The work reported in this paper has concerned the production of forecasts of potential VFT ridership, either diverted from existing travel modes or generated as new travel by the introduction of the VFT. This has required the development of models of the relative attractiveness of the VFT as compared with existing modes of travel. Highly detailed models have been produced, exhibiting plausible time/cost trading and sensible trends in terms of personal or situational variables. We have also developed a simple analysis of responses to questions about future intentions to use the VFT, separating out currently suppressed trips which might be made on the VFT as being the most dependable category of potential induced demand to actually take place. Correspondingly, simple assumptions have been made to allow an insight into the price sensitivity of the market. To support the analyses and forecasts, a very substantial data collection exercise was undertaken to establish the nature and composition of travel in the VFT catchment area. Both intercept surveys of current travellers and face-to-face surveys with current and potential travellers were designed and administered on a large scale. The broad range of these surveys has allowed

139 the integrated analysis of several different types of market data. Regardless of the future of the VFT, the project has contributed substantially to knowledge of the inter-regional travel in the busiest corridor in Australia. We believe the data source to be of high quality, with every evidence that the respondents were thoughtful in their responses and were fully involved in the experiment. That said, we have aimed for conservatism in our interpretation of the data; we have ignored the wider markets of VFT travellers who might use the service primarily for its own sake, and in addition, we have made no estimate of the potential diversion from a number of minor markets such as charter air and coach travel. The forecasting system that was developed is capable of accepting a much greater degree of detail in respect of attributes of the VFT system, and of being extended to cover the parts of the market currently omitted. We have recommended that this work be considered as part of further demand modelling efforts.

Acknowledgements
We would like to acknowledge John Brotchie of CSIRO and Alan Castleman of the VFT Joint Venture for their input to and supervision of the work reported here. Others who played important roles in this research include Frank Milthorpe, Nariida Smith, Andrew Daly, Ken Train, Helen Battellino, Peter Bamard, Julie Young, Peter Gipps, Miles Anderson, John Nichols, Paul Wild, Elizabeth Ampt, Robyn Miller and Applied Surveys (now National Survey Research).

References
Gunn HF, Bradley MA & Hensher DA (1992) A Modelling Approach to the Development of Passenger Forecasts for High-Speed Rail. HCG/Institute of Transport Studies. Hensher DA, Brotchie J & Gunn HF (1989) A Methodology for Investigating the Passenger Demand for High-Speed Rail, Proceedings of the 14th Australasian Transport Research Forum, Perth, 459-476.