DEVELOPMENT AND APPLICATION OF TRAVEL MODE CHOICE MODELS FOR SCHOOL STUDENTS IN METRO MANILA.

A sound understanding of determinants of travel mode choice is an efficient way to design proactive transportation policy and urban planning to encourage non-motorized mode trips in the metropolitan area. The thrust of this study is to develop and apply travel mode choice models for basic education school students in Metro Manila. The study used two different discrete choice models, i.e., multinomial logit (MNL) and multinomial probit (MNP), by taking account of socioeconomic characteristics and urban form attributes. The Person product-moment correlation coefficient function was applied to control co-linearity among explanatory variables. The correlation coefficients implied that household income, travel distance from home to school, and the presence of commuters were the potential factors for the development of travel mode choice models. The findings highlighted that school students with high income and the presence of commuters are most likely to travel by private mode. Respondents located close to schools have the highest likelihood to travel by non-motorized mode. Also, the MNL-based travel mode choice model was applied to simulate the percentage changes of the travel mode choice in response to changes in household income and travel distance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]