Toronto Activity Panel Survey:
Demonstrating the Benefits of a
Multiple Instrument Panel Survey
Matthew J. Roorda
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO
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Can we ever obtain the data we
would like to have?
ACTIVITY ATTRIBUTES OF INTEREST:
Type, purpose, meaning, utility, project, participants, time,
duration, location, tools
SCHEDULING ATTRIBUTES OF INTEREST:
When was activity first conceived? Scheduled for the 1st
time? Original aim? Was the aim achieved? Could other
activities have replaced it? Activity priority? Activity
Flexibility in time and space? Cost of dropping or
changing an activity etc…
(Axhausen, 1998)
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Can we ever obtain the data we
would like to have?
AXHAUSEN’S CONCLUSIONS:
•
We will never obtain all the data we need from one
person
•
We need to distribute the data needs across multiple
persons using multiple survey instruments
OUR REPONSE:
•
Toronto Area Panel Survey
•
3-wave, multi-instrument panel survey
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Overview of the Panel Survey
•
3 Waves – households contacted once a year
•
271 households
•
Multiple household members participate
•
Study Area: City of Toronto, Urban York Region,
Mississauga
•
A panel survey is being conducted simultaneously in
Quebec City
•
Core Survey Data – 2 day activity diary
•
Additional data collected for each wave
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Multiple Instrument Design
CORE SURVEY DATA
ADDITIONAL SURVEY DATA
WAVE 1
Detailed
Scheduling Info,
7 days
ALL WAVES
2–day detailed
activity
diary
WAVE 2
Stated Preference
Scheduling
Conflicts
WAVE 3
GPS route
tracking
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Wave 1 – CHASE
Chase Scheduling
Diary
Retrieve data
from laptop
Follow-up
Interview
Interview
Household
Household keeps
schedules on laptop
for 7 days
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Wave 1 – CHASE
Additional Survey Data
•
7-days activity schedule with activity description, time,
duration, location, mode, participants,
•
Planning process for all activities (when planned,
modified, deleted)
•
Revealed information on how scheduling conflicts
handled
•
Flexibility of activities in time, space, mode, participants
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Wave 2 – Stated Adaptation Survey
•
Participants keep a 2 day “memory jogger” diary
•
Activity diary is retrieved by telephone
•
ONE out-of-home activity chosen randomly from the
person’s diary. Stated Adaptation questions are asked
about that activity.
•
Set of TWO consecutive activities is chosen randomly.
Stated Adaptation questions asked to to try to assess
activity priority.
•
Purpose – understand conflict resolution strategies
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Wave 2 – Stated Adaptation Survey
Example Questions:
“What would have happened if you had a 1 hour delay in
getting to this activity?”
“What would you have done if the car mode was not
available to get to that activity?”
“Imagine that work was going to take longer than you
planned. This would have caused you to be 1 hour late
for your dinner engagement. What would you have
done?”
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Wave 3 – GPS Tracking?
•
Survey not yet designed
•
Possibly a GPS unit with a hand-held scheduling device
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Benefits of Using a Multi-Instrument
Panel
•
Obtain benefits of a multi-wave panel (core data
collected in each year is consistent)
– long vs short term dynamics of scheduling behaviour
– Assess behaviour changes in response to other changes in
the household
•
Benefits of Multi-Instrument
- assess instrument bias (core data collected in different
ways)
- Many more additional data elements
- Survey more interesting for respondents (lower rates of
attrition)
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An Example Person – Wave 1
Thursday
Home
Sleep
Breakfast
Home
Cleaning
Meal
TV
Wash/dress
Sleep
Friday
6:00am
Work
3:30pm
4:30pm
Shop
Home
Sleep
Breakfast
Home
Cleaning
Meal
TV
Wash/dress
Sleep
6:00am
Work
3:00pm
Bank
3:45pm
Post Office
5:15pm
4:15pm
Get
Newspaper
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The Same Person – Wave 2
Thursday
5:50
Home
Sleep
Breakfast
Ready for work
Friday
5:40
10:30
Work
Coffee
Work
10:50
13:30
14:30
Work
Home
15:00
Loc’n 2
Play with kids
Shop
Prepare dinner
Eat dinner
18:15
18:25
Home
Drop off wife
Visit
Kids to bed
Friend
Pickup wife
Sleep
21:30
21:40
Home
Sleep
Ready for work
Home
Clean house
Prepare dinner
Eat dinner
Home
Kids homework
Home
Kids to bed
Sleep
9:10
Work
Coffee
Work
9:30
14:08
15:00
Work
15:50
Loc’n 2
Shop
18:15
18:25
21:45
22:00
Drop off wife
Pickup wife
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Core Survey Data Comparison
Data Element
Wave 1
Wave 2 (1st 24)
Avg Activities/Day – weekday
13.70
13.14
Avg Activities/Day – weekend
13.12
12.32
Avg Trips/Day – weekday
4.44
4.91
Avg Trips/Day – weekend
3.51
2.82
% Trips by Transit - weekday
12.9%
5.6%
% Trips by Transit – weekend
4.4%
0%
Lots of other comparative statistics can be generated…
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Other Ideas for Analysis
Comparison of the Core 2-day Survey
•
Further explore habitual behaviour
– Are preplanned activities more habitual than spontaneous
activities?
– Which elements of a schedule are consistent from year to
year? Departure time for the 1st activity?
•
Assessment of survey instruments
– Assess whether differences in waves be attributed to
survey instrument? Or are there real shifts in behaviour
over time?
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Ideas for Analysis
Exploiting the Additional Data from Each Wave
– Can we summarize the planning behaviour from Wave 1
into some person attributes that can be used to better
explain executed schedules in Wave2?
(e.g. Organized person vs scatterbrain?)
– Revealed (Wave 1) vs hypothetical (Wave 2) scheduling
strategies. Are they consistent?
– Build scheduling rules for modelling