Impact of bus priority attributes on catchment area residents in Dublin, Ireland

In many jurisdictions, political and infrastructural restrictions have limited the feasibility of road pricing as a response to urban congestion. Accordingly, the allocation of dedicated road space to high frequency buses has emerged as a second-best option. Analyses of the evidence emerging from this option emphasize the engineering and technical issues and do not systematically interrogate the customers, those in the bus catchment area that use or could potentially use the service. This paper attempts to correct for this asymmetry in focus by analyzing characteristics and preferences of users and non-users through a survey of 1,000 households for a particular quality bus catchment area in Dublin, Ireland. Preliminary findings are encouraging, both for the use of this policy instrument as one which can yield considerable consumer satisfaction, and in terms of modal share analysis, especially because the corridor under scrutiny represents a much higher socio-economic profile than Dublin or Ireland as a whole.