Chapter 2

• Given the population size and its decomposition by household class and age, transport volumes and their decomposition by modes and vehicle types result from:

  1. the wants, needs, preferences and choice options of people and firms; 2. the locations of activities such as living, working and shopping; 3. transport resistance, often expressed in time, money, costs and other factors, which we refer to as 'effort' and which include, among others, risks, reliability of the transport system and comfort.
• Accessibility:


  The extent to which land-use and transport systems enable (groups of) individuals to reach activities or destinations by means of a (combination of) transport mode(s) at various times of the day (perspective of persons), and the extent to which land-use and transport systems enable companies, facilities and other activity places to receive people, goods and information at various times of the day (perspective of locations of activities).
• The transport system shapes

  travel behaviour and impacts accessibility, the environment, safety, health, and well-being.
• The role the transport system

  plays in fulfilling people's needs depends on time and space.
• Transport volumes depend on the

  'locations of these activities'.
• What can be seen on the map matters (land-use patterns), as well as the functional relationships between the

  locations of living, working, services and so on.
• Transport resistance:

  Factors relevant for development in transport is the resistance needed to travel between locations, including travel time, monetary costs, and other aspects such as comfort and safety. All of the cists together is the GTC.
• Lower generalized transport costs (GTC)


  results in more transport.
• First, GTC depends on the

  quality and quantity of infrastructures of all types (roads, rail, rivers and canals, airline and port connections).
• Second, traffic volumes at a certain infrastructure section related to its capacity are relevant:

  if demand exceeds capacity, congestion occurs, and this results in longer travel times.
• Third, infrastructure related regulations have an impact on

  GTC, especially maximum speeds. Fourth, the characteristics of vehicles matter, especially the comfort levels and costs.
• Fifth, safety levels matter, and they depend on

  the infrastructure and vehicle characteristics and the way people use vehicles (driving style).
• Finally, monetary costs of private and public transport have an impact on

  GTC.
• GTC depends on:

  quality and quantity of infrastructures of all types, traffic volumes at a certain infrastructure section related to its capacity are relevant, infrastructure related regulations, the characteristics of vehicles matter, safety levels matter, monetary costs of private and public transport.
• Travel resistance also depends on factors such as

  comfort, reliability of travel times, safety, crowdedness in public transport as well as the perceived positive or negative aspects of walking and cycling.
• A final resistance factor that has become increasingly important is

  Information and Communication Technology (ICT).
• Needs and desires;

  locations; and transport resistance have an impact on travel behaviour of people.
• Mode choice is mainly determined by

  the transport system in terms of mode-specific generalized transport costs.
• Route choice depends on

  generalized transport costs of route options available for each mode.
• Departure time choices mainly depend on

  characteristics of activity locations, but also on variations of generalized transport costs over a day.
• The individual travel behaviour choices determine

  four characteristics of aggregate transport flows.
• Income levels and travel times (or more general: resistance) probably have the

  largest impact on trip frequency and kilometres travelled (transport volume).
• Composition of traffic and transport refers mainly to the


  modal split (the distribution of all trips and kilometres travelled over transport modes, mainly car, public transport (train, bus, tram, metro), bicycle, walking), but it can also refer to the distribution over vehicle types. The distribution over vehicle types (for example, electric cars versus diesel or petrol cars, car size) can influence emissions and safety levels.
• Given a certain traffic volume,

  the spatial division (equivalently: division over space in Figure 2.1) of traffic has an impact on congestion, safety, the environment and health. The spatial division includes the breakdown of road class.
• The temporal division (equivalently: division over time) of traffic is relevant.


  Night traffic causes more noise nuisance than daytime traffic. Combining the division over time and space, a more balanced division of traffic over time causes less congestion (and this is a reason why economists often favour time (and space) dependent road user charges).
• Location, time and space of traffic and the capacity of road networks are seen


  to influence traffic flows, and these flows in turn influence the speed specific capacity of roads.
• The transport system (the main determinant for resistance) influences


  the wants and needs of people.
• A lower transport resistance may fuel the


  wish to participate in more remote activities. High risk factors may reduce the wish to travel.
• Land-use and the transport system

  mutually interact.
• Changes in location have an impact on

  transport resistance of travelling by car and public transport, and this may result in an increased desire to own a (second) car.
• A lower transport resistance results in

  new locations for activities and increases in distances travelled.
• Land-use influences peoples


  wants and needs. If more people visit restaurants, this may increase the number of restaurants.
• For goods transport, the same categories of factors are relevant:

  volumes of goods transport, expressed in tonne kilometres per mode, and traffic volumes, expressed in kilometres per vehicle type, result from the locations of activities that generate goods transport, the wants and needs of producers and consumers and transport resistance.
• The technologies applied in transport include

  both those for vehicles and those for infrastructure. They may have an impact on transport volumes.
• Driving behaviour is relevant for

  environmental impacts.
• Travel times and transport resistance are related to

  speed (road capacity).
• Safety is related to

  driving behaviour.
• Level of accessibility depends on


  the location of activities, quality and quantity of infrastructures and needs of people and companies.
• The level of accessibility has an impact on the economy.