A Comprehensive Analysis of Neighborhood Physical Environment Characteristics on Auto Ownership Levels

(PI: Chandra Bhat)

There has been an increasing interest in the land use-transportation connection in the past decade, motivated by the possibility that design policies associated with the built environment can be used to control, manage, and shape individual traveler behavior and aggregate travel demand. In this line of research and application pursuit, it is critical to understand whether the empirically observed association between the built environment and travel behavior-related variables is a true reflection of underlying causality or simply a spurious correlation attributable to the intervening relationship between the built environment and the characteristics of people who choose to live in particular built environments.

In this project, we will identify the research designs and methodologies that may be used to test the presence of “true” causality versus residential sorting-based “spurious” associations in the land-use transportation connection. The project will also develop a methodological formulation to control for residential sorting effects in the analysis of the effect of built environment attributes on travel behavior-related choices. The formulation will be applied to comprehensively examine the impact of the built environment, transportation network attributes, and demographic characteristics on residential choice and car ownership decisions.

Keywords: Land Use–Transportation Interaction, Residential Choice, Car Ownership, Discrete Choice Models, Simulated Maximum Likelihood