Measuring the Benefits of Intercity Passenger Rail: A Study

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valuable insight on the design of future studies of this type. Lessons learned during the data collection procedure (particularly the benefits of the support and involvement of the on-board staff) will be useful in the design and execution of future on-board surveys of intercity passenger rail passengers. Finally, although the quality control review employed in this study had only a small impact on the quality of the overall data set (per-item response rate increase of two percentage points), future surveys may benefit from the quality control procedures described in this report. It is recommended that researchers that are planning an on-board survey of intercity rail passengers consider the lessons learned in this study during all stages of future on-board surveys. Proposed development of high-speed passenger rail in the United States will likely result in the need to deploy studies similar to the one described in this report to measure progress toward major policy initiatives and ensure that funding is being distributed accordingly. While the characteristics of passengers using future high-speed rail routes are likely to be different than the characteristics of the Heartland Flyer passengers in this study, the study methodology utilized in this research can be transferred into a high-speed rail on-board survey application with few, if any, modifications. FUTURE RESEARCH Future research on the topic of intercity rail passenger behavior and the impacts of passenger rail on intercity mobility and the communities it serves can take many directions. Given a limited amount of resources, new data collection efforts could either focus on gathering additional data for the Heartland Flyer or other corridors where surveys have been done in the past or fund new data collection on corridors where surveys have not been done in some time or have not been done at all. Pre- and post-facto on-board surveys could also be deployed on a route where service improvements were made (such as travel time improvements) to observe any changes in traveler behavior resulting from the improvement. The “before and after” approach may be particularly useful if it is necessary to document how funding for certain passenger rail projects accomplished progress toward policy outcomes, such as reducing highway congestion. On-board surveys might also be useful in certain corridors where short-distance service may be established on an intercity segment currently-served by an Amtrak long-distance route. 134
Future research can also focus on improving the data collection and analysis methodology processes. The state of practice would definitely be improved if a formal sampling plan could be developed that allowed for the estimation of variance and the resulting inferences that can be made about the population while also acknowledging the need to optimize studyrelated costs. Innovative survey approaches, such as a two-part form (hand-in and mail-back) or the use of electronic “tablet” devices for the tabulation of passenger responses might also be an area for future study. Future surveys might also focus on obtaining more detailed origin and destination information, to develop a database of passenger information with increased geographic precision. This would allow for a more refined estimate of a route’s market area. Finally, future surveys should take special care to identify passengers on a survey run who have already participated in the study and consider how these passengers might be accounted for in the total population of ridership without requiring them to complete a second survey form. 135
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1. Report No. SWUTC/10/169116-1 2.
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ABSTRACT In recent years, the polic
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LIST OF FIGURES Page Figure 3-1: He
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY INTRODUCTION In i
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ail service along intercity corrido
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planning faces a variety of challen
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of travel (in the absence of rail s
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participate in the study. Throughou
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such as medical appointments or fun
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Heartland Flyer annually. Induced t
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Heartland Flyer identified in this
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DISCLAIMER The contents of this rep
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CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION In its Dece
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to Fort Worth intercity corridor wa
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• An overview of intercity passen
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passenger deficit for the year 1969
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In April 2009, the Federal Railroad
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conditions across the United States
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Table 2-2: State-Supported Routes i
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Oklahoma and Texas support service
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conducted by the Southeastern Wisco
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Discussion of State-Supported Rail
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• The 1993 Illinois Passenger Rai
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INTERCITY PASSENGER RAIL PLANNING T
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Data Needs for Intercity Passenger
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supported routes. The following par
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• Third, the total non-business r
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demand model varies, Horowitz and F
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Survey Design Literature Deploying
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Table 2-4: Elements Included in On-
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question. This pattern is consisten
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a particular corridor. For example,
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CHAPTER 3: DESCRIPTION OF HEARTLAND
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• After passing through Davis, th
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minutes early. A later section of t
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corridor. Table 3-1 shows a snapsho
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enefits resulting from the route’
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state of Oklahoma (71). This action
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served by the route are Pauls Valle
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Figure 3-4: Typical P42DC Locomotiv
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during non-peak times when the usua
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effect during this research study w
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HEARTLAND FLYER SERVICE DATA The fo
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Examining the 10-year monthly avera
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surprisingly, is Oklahoma City-Fort
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Figure 3-9: Heartland Flyer On-Time
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CHAPTER 4: DATA COLLECTION The main
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amenities that could increase rail
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pool be increased to 3,000. The IRB
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Summary of Data Collection Tables 4
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Ineligible Passengers Several group
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QUALITY CONTROL After completing th
Page 113 and 114: For the access mode to station ques
Page 115 and 116: One question on the survey asked th
Page 117 and 118: trip). However, researchers determi
Page 119 and 120: eporting how far passengers were fr
Page 121 and 122: CHAPTER 5: DATA ANALYSIS This chapt
Page 123 and 124: survey item by the total number of
Page 125 and 126: Comparing the total column in Table
Page 127 and 128: Tables 5-5 and 5-6 display another
Page 129 and 130: Heartland Flyer Market Area Researc
Page 131 and 132: Table 5-9: Passenger Trip Purpose,
Page 133 and 134: PASSENGER CHARACTERISTICS Passenger
Page 135 and 136: is entirely possible that a passeng
Page 137 and 138: In both April and July, the two mos
Page 139 and 140: Table 5-19: Passenger State of Resi
Page 141 and 142: Figure 5-2: Residential Zip Codes o
Page 143 and 144: Gender Table 5-22 reports passenger
Page 145 and 146: Household Income Table 5-26 reports
Page 147 and 148: In FFY 2009, the Heartland Flyer ra
Page 149 and 150: Table 5-28: Passenger Alternatives
Page 151 and 152: Urban and Rural Mobility Another co
Page 153 and 154: passenger was approximately $120 in
Page 155 and 156: if the service did not exist (appro
Page 157: This study measured the mobility im
Page 160 and 161: questions on the passenger’s boar
Page 162 and 163: made is related to the similarity b
Page 167 and 168: REFERENCES 1. National Surface Tran
Page 169 and 170: 35. Corey, Canapary & Galanis Resea
Page 171: 74. Able Consulting. Tier 1 Environ
Page 174 and 175: Figure A-3: Purcell Amtrak Station
Page 176 and 177: Figure A-7: Fort Worth Amtrak Stati
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