Satisfaction with Public Transport Trips

2.3.4. Other influencing factors 
Built-environment 
Perceptual and non-perceptual built-environment characteristics may also influence the traveler 
experience. To date, the influence of land-use on travel behavior is inconclusive. For instance, while some 
authors postulate that land use does not sway the capacity of travelers living in an area that is suitable for 
walking and cycling (e.g. Cervero et al., 2006), some other (Saelens et al., 2003) found the opposite. Part 
of the reason for these inconclusive results can be due to the effect of perceptual built-environment 

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characteristics such as crime perceptions. For instance, Handy et al. (2005) found that a composite 
variable consisting of: safety feelings on the neighborhood, the level of crowding, and lighting conditions, 
was one of the most prominent factors influencing driving and walking. 
On the whole, the influence of built-environment characteristics has been proved on mode choice but not 
yet on the travel satisfaction evaluation. 
Weather 
There is growing evidence that proves the influence of weather characteristics (i.e. temperature, snow, 
rain) on travel behavior (e.g. Saneinejad et al., 2012). Most of the previous studies focused on the impact 
of weather conditions on travel mode choice and the relationship with PT ridership (e.g. Tao et al., 2018). 
Very little attention has thus been given to their impact on travel satisfaction. St-Louis et al. (2014) 
studied the seasonal impact of weather on different travel modes and found that cold and snowy winters 
exert a negative effect on travel satisfaction of mainly active modes but also bus. Ettema et al. (2017) 
revealed that any form of precipitation positively impacts travel satisfaction evaluations and that wind 
speed over 4 m/s has a positive effect on activation for PT trips. These two studies, however, considered 
only commuter trips, studied two seasons (Ettema et al., 2017) and trips made to the same destination (St-
Louis et al., 2014). It is thus clear that the impact of weather on travel satisfaction has not been fully 
covered in depth by previous studies. 
Accessibility 
We hypothesize that distance proximity to PT stops/stations and accessibility generalized costs from 
origin to destination would impact the travel experience. To date, the impact of distance proximity has 
mainly been studied on mode choice and use (i.e. Rietveld, 2000) while its impact on satisfaction has 
been neglected. The exception to this was Brons et al. (2009) who studied the importance of accessibility 
in assessing the overall travel satisfaction. Their results demonstrated that their measures of accessibility 
(e.g. distance to PT, travel times by PT) to train stations only marginally affected overall travel 
satisfaction. 
The factors influencing the travel experience are not limited to the ones exposed in this section. Ettema et 
al. (2010), for instance, hypothesized that overall travel satisfaction is related to social well-being and 
thus since well-being is larger for the younger and elderly these groups would have higher travel 

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satisfaction. Moreover, travel attitudes and preferences towards the environment, life and travel modes 
have also been found to be impactful. For example, for commuter travel attitudes were found to impact 
their travel satisfaction directly and their mode choice indirectly (Ye and Titheridge, 2017).