Passengers' travel behavior before and after the adjustment of regular bus collinear sections: A case study in the incipient phase of metro operation in Xiamen

Increasing Chinese cities are constructing the metro transit system, which is considered an effective way to reduce urban traffic congestion and meet the rapid growth of travel demand. However, the operation of a new metro line typically coincides with the adjustment or cancellation of regular bus routes along the metro corridor. This paper evaluates the impact of the introduction of a new metro system on the travel mode choice of passengers in the collinear segment. Through longitudinal analysis using the travel data of the same integrated circuit (IC) card owners collected before and after the opening of the metro line, we study how passengers’ travel behaviors changed under a dual traffic environment in which a new metro line has been opened and the collinear bus has been adjusted. In this study, we selected travel distance, travel time difference, whether traveling during peak hours, and the number of colinear stations as independent variables to build a binary logic regression to find out the probability of regular bus collinear segment passengers choosing the metro in the above circumstance. The logistic model shows that mode switching occurs at the highest rate when a regular bus line shares four collinear stations with the metro and declines when the collinear section becomes longer or shorter. Further, the research results indicate that passengers on the collinear sections are more inclined to choose buses during rush hour. This study provides new evidence to better help transit agencies coordinate existing bus services and the new metro system.