Empirical Analysis of Commute Trip Chaining: Case Study of Shangyu, China

Given the churning mass of congestion in most Chinese cities, a better understanding of simple and complex trip-chaining decision making is essential to transportation researchers and policy makers in China. Using the travel data collected in the city of Shangyu (a small city in east China), this paper develops an empirical framework to examine how individual–household sociodemographics, location factors, work schedule, and mode choice affect the individual choice between simple and complex commute trip chains. Besides descriptive statistics, cross tabulation and logistic regression are used in this research. Empirical results show that members of dual-worker households, office workers or employees in service trades, middle-aged or older workers, residents in the center of the old city or a new district, commuters using flexible modes, and workers with late work start or ending times are more likely to make complex commute trip chains.