Investigating Spatiotemporal Characteristics of Demand Responsive Transport (DRT) Service for the Disabled through Survival Analysis

The importance of Demand Responsive Transport (DRT) has increased as it guarantees the right to travel and improves mobility for special population groups such as disabled people and low income households. In order for DRT to become a sustainable means of transportation, it is necessary to keep the quality of DRT service above a certain level that might be expected by users, and thus DRT service needs to be provided evenly over time and space. This study aims to investigate the spatiotemporal characteristics of DRT service based on waiting time in terms of service equity. For the analysis, operating data of DRT for people with disabilities provided from the Seoul Metropolitan Government were used and a survival analysis was employed to derive median waiting time. The results showed that there exists a difference in median waiting time over time and space, indicating that DRT service for disabled is not evenly provided over time and space. The results of using a heat map and Kernel density plot with median waiting time also confirmed that the spatiotemporal imbalances of DRT service exist throughout Seoul. One of the major reasons for this phenomenon might be the uneven spatiotemporal distribution of supply as expected.