Siim Sööt

WELFARE REFORM AND SPATIAL MATCHING BETWEEN CLIENTS AND JOBS

Abstract. The recent Welfare Reform Act requires several categories of public assistance recipients to transition to the work force. In most metropolitan areas public assistance clients reside great distances from areas of entry-level jobs. Any program designed to provide access to these jobs, for those previously on public aid, needs relevant transportation services when the job search process begins. Therefore it is essential that the latent demand for commuting among public aid clients be assessed in developing public transportation services. The location of entry-level jobs must also be known or, as in this article, estimated using numerous data sources. This article reports on such a demand estimation effort, focusing primarily on the use of Regional Science methods.

Estimation of static travel times in a dynamic route guidance system-II

In an earlier paper a method for computing static profiles of link travel times was given. In this paper, the centrality of such profiles for ATIS is examined and the methods given in the earlier paper are applied to actual data. Except for a minor, easily correctable problem, the methods are shown to work very well under real-life conditions.

A SPATIAL EMPLOYMENT AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT MODEL

This paper describes a powerful yet user-friendly large-scale model for urban and regional economic development planning, which is under development at the University of Illinois at Chicago. The procedure, called the Spatial Employment and Economic Development (SEED) procedure, currently gives a variety of labor-shed information. It can also provide the means to evaluate job-training and transportation system improvements.

Activity and Travel Changes of Users of Job Access Transportation Service: Analysis of a User Survey

The Job Access and Reverse Commute (JARC) program of the FTA provides funding to improve the access to and from jobs for welfare recipients and low-income individuals. The objective of the study was to develop a comprehensive profile of JARC service riders on several economic, social, perceptual, and travel-related indicators on the basis of a data set that was collected by the authors from riders of fixed-route and demand-responsive services in 23 locations across the country that were funded by this program. The economic indicators considered include incomes of riders, full-and part-time work status, employment tenure, reported changes in employment status (transitioning from unemployment to employment), and changes in wages incurred after using the service. Social indicators include vehicle ownership, drivers license, and educational attainment. Where possible, JARC service riders were compared with a national sample of automobile and transit users; the data for these measures were obtained from the d...

EVALUATING EFFECTIVENESS OF REAL-TIME ADVANCED TRAVELER INFORMATION SYSTEMS USING A SMALL TEST VEHICLE FLEET

ADVANCE was an in-vehicle advanced traveler information system (ATIS) providing route guidance in real time that operated in the northwestern portion and northwest suburbs of Chicago, Illinois. It used probe vehicles to generate dynamically travel time information about expressways, arterials, and local streets. Tests to evaluate the subsystems of ADVANCE, executed with limited availability of test vehicles and stringent scheduling, are described; they provided useful insights into both the performance of the ADVANCE system as a whole and the desirable and effective characteristics of ATIS deployments generally. Tests found that the user features of an in-route guidance system must be able to accommodate a broad range of technological sophistication and network knowledge among the population likely to become regular users of such a system. For users who know the local network configuration, only a system giving reliable real-time data about nonrecurrent congestion is likely to find a market base beyond specialized applications. In general, the quality and usefulness of systemwide real-time route guidance provided by other means are enhanced significantly by even a small deployment of probes: probe data greatly improve static (archival average) link travel time estimates by time of day, although the guidance algorithms that use these data should also include arterial traffic signal timings. Moreover, probe- and detector-based incident detection on arterial networks shows considerable promise for improved performance and reliability.

Determinants of Perceived Importance of Targeted Transportation Services for Low-Income Riders

It is generally agreed that transit services in disadvantaged neighborhoods can have potentially positive effects on the accessibility of socially excluded or economically marginalized families. The impact of transit services has been quantified by using objective measures, such as travel time, travel cost, and changes in earnings or destinations reached. Although the body of literature on this topic is exhaustive, researchers have acknowledged the importance of more subjective measures associated with trip decision making of individuals. An index of perceived service importance (PSI) was used to study the impact of the subjective dimension of trip making. Riders of transit services were surveyed, and a conceptual model of activity changes that may be enabled by the services of the Job Access Reverse Commute program was designed to facilitate the modeling process. An ordered probit model was developed to explore the relationship between PSI and sociodemographics, service type and characteristics, employme...

THE LOGIT MODAL SPLIT MODEL: SOME THEORETICAL CONSIDERATIONS

Abstract This paper discusses a theoretical basis for the logit function and demonstrates its theoretical connection with the discriminant function. Some consequences of the relationship between the discriminant function and the logit model, especially applications to fitting logit models are also presented.

Nationwide Survey of Transportation Planning Courses: Introduction, Findings, and Recommendations

This paper reports on a nationwide survey that was conducted from November 2004 through April 2005. The survey is part of a project titled the National Transportation Planning Course Syllabus and Associated Case Studies, funded by the Dwight David Eisenhower Transportation Fellowship program at the U.S. Department of Transportation. The primary objective of the survey was to determine what topics are currently being covered and their level of emphasis. The secondary objective was to identify topics for which educators would use case studies and references provided by the U.S. Department of Transportation. Instructors of transportation planning courses from 47 universities were chosen for the survey, and they returned 32 completed survey instruments. On the basis of the survey efforts, it was found that, first, the survey and the project that it serves can be useful in improving transportation planning instruction at U.S. universities; second, the survey and the project were welcomed by most universities and educators surveyed; third, the survey results can potentially be used for multiple purposes; fourth, not having a list of the institutions offering a transportation planning course(s) posed challenges for sample selection for the survey and validation of the survey results; and fifth, it is difficult to design a survey instrument for a discipline such as transportation planning, which is dynamic and ever changing.

Integrated and Continuing Transportation Services for Seniors: Case Studies of New Freedom Program

The aging of the American population has raised a number of concerns about senior mobility. The New Freedom (NF) program, which was designed to go above and beyond the transportation requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act, has been used to fund transportation for seniors. The primary purpose of this paper is to present the results of an exploratory analysis of the social, physical, and functional health and mobility outcomes experienced by seniors who are clients of NF services and the associated Coordinated Human Services Transportation Plan (CHSTP) processes. The paper uses data from primary surveys of the following groups from seven urban, suburban, and rural locations: (a) NF-funded transportation service users, (b) program managers operating the services, and (c) locally selected lead and partner organizations involved in developing the CHSTPs. Results show that concerns about senior mobility vary significantly by a number of functional, social, and physical disability indicators, including instrumental activities of daily living. These indicators are substantially more complex than a chronological accounting of age. A principal component analysis yielded two constructs underlying seniors’ mobility: a transportation deprivation component and an independence and health deprivation component. Each component has implications for different types of services. To the extent that the NF program has supported transportation services that are supplemental to integrated care for seniors and thereby enable a continuum of care, the program has enhanced community-based interventions to meet the complex mobility needs of seniors in the seven locations.

Toward Improved Traffic Safety: Road Use Perception and Behavior in Estonia

Rapid increases in motorization have raised concerns about accidents and fatalities internationally. Even nations that are experiencing declining numbers of fatalities, such as Estonia, have made reducing fatalities a major public policy goal. Traffic fatalities declined from 491 in 1991 to 204 in 2000 in Estonia. The federal government is intent on another 50% decrease by 2010. Two steps are necessary to achieve this decrease: understanding of the perceptions of road use behavior and field observations of driving and pedestrian practices. In May and June 2001, 655 subjects were surveyed to assess their perceptions of road use behavior. Drunken driving, lack of seat-belt use in the rear seat, and speeding on rural roads were all perceived to be problems. Generational differences accounted for the greatest differences in perception. The young gave higher scores to most road use activities, suggesting that better driver education may be needed. The number of fatalities and field observation indicate that treatment of pedestrians is an area in need of attention, especially because of the perception that it is not a major problem. Pedestrians accounted for 39% of motor-vehicle-related fatalities in Estonia in 2000. In field observations, 70% of drivers were observed to be in violation of the law requiring them to yield to pedestrians. Pedestrians themselves are not without blame; in field observations, 26% of pedestrians were seen to be in violation at signalized crossings. Finally, speeding continues to be a perceived and observed problem.