By Gwen Kash, PhD Candidate, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Presented at Transforming Transportation 2016

1. www.TransformingTransportation.org
Socially Sustainable Transport:
Identifying User Needs In Latin American
Transit Reform
Gwen Kash, PhD Candidate, University of North Carolina
at Chapel Hill
Presented at Transforming Transportation 2016

2. SOCIALLY SUSTAINABLE TRANSPORT:
Identifying User Needs In Latin American
Transit Reform
GWEN KASH
Lee Schipper Scholar and PhD Candidate
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
gwenkash@email.unc.edu
All photos by the author
Unless otherwise specified

3. CHECK THE FIT

4. ABOUT THE PROJECT
BOGOTÁ & SOACHA, COLOMBIA
TRANSMILENIO
LA PAZ & EL ALTO, BOLIVIA
INFORMAL TRANSPORT

5. TRANSMILENIO IN 30 SECONDS

7. 9%
22%
22%
24%
26%
36%
Cost
Crime
Lack of…
User Culture
Crowding
Travel Times
WHAT ARE TWO
PROBLEMS WITH TRANSMILENIO
TODAY?
Sample size: 720
Disorganization

8. TRAVEL TIMES, TRANSLATED:
Not enough buses
The buses pass by
already full. It’s
impossible to enter
Interminable queue
to enter the station
The stations are overflowing.
It’s impossible to catch a bus.
People lose hope.
When buses finally arrive,
everyone wants to get on at
once.
Traffic jams.

9. CRITICAL INCIDENTS METHOD:
“In the last seven days, on how many days
have you had to make a queue
to enter the station?”

10. CRITICAL INCIDENTS METHOD:
“In the last seven days, on how many days
have you had to make a queue
to enter the station?”
How much does this experience
bother you?

11. Most Disliked Less Disliked
Least Disliked
Let full buses pass
Trip longer than usual
Waited 15+ minutes
Someone pushed them
Excessive crowding
Queue to enter the station
Saw someone
Evading
the Fare
or
Jaywalking
in the busway
Encountered a
Musician
or
Vendor

12. Getting the Big Picture:
“DISLIKE FACTORS”
(affective reactivity factors)
1. Dislike for
Quality of Service
Problems
 Crowding
 Pushing
 Waiting/Queuing
 Travel Times
2. Dislike for
Rule-breaking
by other passengers
 Fare Evasion
 Jaywalking in
Busway
3. Dislike for
Commerce
In the system
 Vendors
 Musicians

13. THERE IS NO RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN
WITNESSING
FARE EVASION
THINKING IT’S
A PROBLEM
&

14. EFFECT OF GENDER AND EXPERIENCE ON
STRENGTH OF DISLIKE FOR
QUALITY OF SERVICE PROBLEMS
Being female
Sexual assault victim (women)
Robbery victim
Hearing about robbery
Daily experiences
Sample size = 401 R2 = 0.226
+
+
+
+−

15. “I’m very short, so sometimes I can’t
breathe well.” –TransMilenio user

16. “I DON’T FEEL COMFORTABLE ON
TRANSMILENIO. YOU’RE ALWAYS ON
THE DEFENSIVE SO THEY DON’T TOUCH
YOU, WATCHING OUT TO SEE WHO’S IN
FRONT OF YOU, WHO’S BEHIND YOU,
WHO’S ALL AROUND YOU.”
–TransMilenio user, assault victim

17. Encountered a
Musician
or
Vendor
HAS SOMEONE
YIELDED THEIR
SEAT TO YOU?
People traveling with
young children:
44%
N = 95
People with a
Disability:
68%
N = 24

18. Photo: Iván Asturizaga
INTERVIEWS ARE VITAL

19. FAILING TO EFFECTIVELY IDENTIFY
& PLAN FOR DIVERSE NEEDS
LEAVES PEOPLE BEHIND.

20. CRITICAL INCIDENTS METHOD:
A VALUABLE ADDITION TO SUSTAINABLE
TRANSPORT PLANNERS’TOOLBOXES
• Matches survey questions to transit
users’ experiences & vocabularies
• Use interviews to adapt to local context
• Can be combined with other methods &
question styles.
• Factor analysis reduces information overload
• Provides detailed, actionable data

21. SOCIALLY SUSTAINABLE
TRANSPORT IMPROVES LIVES.
• Measure users’ self-identified needs by
talking with users
• Early and often
• Surveys and Interviews: better together
• Proactively seek out marginalized groups
• Identify and alleviate the extra burdens
vulnerable populations face
YOU CAN FIND THE FIT.

22. THANK YOU:
Dirección de
Transporte
Daniel Rodriguez, Dario Hidalgo, Carolina Martínez Ávila, Eva Sclippa, Holger Dalkmann,
Larissa Fernándes Da Silva, Óscar Díaz, Ramón Muñoz-Raskin, Rodrigo Criales, Sam
Zimmerman, Tammy Brackett, Travis Green, Vanessa Nwanko, Jim & Carol Tsang, the
bogotanos, soachunos, paceños, and alteños who gave their time to talk to me,
… and many, many others