Improving regional bus transport : seeking possibilities to attract new users and maintain the current users in The Netherlands

This research analyzes possibilities to attract new users to regional public transport, while maintaining the current users in an effective and efficient manner. To be able to attract users, it is necessary to know who the most potential users are. A literature study has revealed that the most potential users are users who travel with the purposes of commuting, business, education, and recreation. Travelers with these purposes are more sensitive towards improvements in public transport than those that travel with other purposes, and they have a higher participation in the transport system. However, purposes of travelers can change numerous times per day. For that reason it is interesting to know what type of people travel the most with the before mentioned purposes across all modes. For educational purposes, these are people who attend all types of educational facilities up to academic education. For the other purposes, working people that do not work at home make the most trips. An analysis of the purpose distribution of public transport trips yields that other proportions are valid; there are barely trips with recreational and business purposes, some trips with commuting purpose, and a lot of trips with educational purpose. It means that gains are possible among these groups, if their needs regarding traveling are fulfilled. Further literature study and a case study showed that there is need for improvement of the image of public transport. This means that on the one hand there is a need for operational improvements such as reliability, door-to-door travel time, and directness and on the other hand there is a need for better communication with the passenger