Work

Measuring Job Accessibility Through Integrating Travel Time, Transit Fare And Income: A Study Of The Chicago Metropolitan Area

Year: 2020

Type: article

Abstract: Job accessibility, as a crucial social equity indicator, has been primarily measured by travel time/distance and transit fare. However, the effect of income has rarely been integrated with the total travel monetary cost (i.e. the sum of transit fare and travel time monetary cost) in measuring job accessibility. The different sensitivity to travel cost of people with different income levels should be included in job accessibility measures. This study proposes a measure that turns travel time, transit fare and income into a comparable unit and considers the total travel monetary cost as a percentage of income. We measure transit‐based accessibility to low‐pay jobs in Chicago before and after considering the total travel monetary cost as a percentage of income. The results indicate that the job accessibility for low‐income people is overestimated while the job accessibility for non‐low‐income people is underestimated based on the traditional measure. The proposed measure mitigates the overestimation and underestimation effects and helps better inform policy‐makers of the real job accessibility distribution pattern.

Source: Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie

DOI: 10.1111/tesg.12415

Authors: Dong Liu, Mei‐Po Kwan

Institutions: University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Utrecht University

Language: English

Topic: Urban Transport and Accessibility

Subfield: Transportation

Field: Social Sciences

Domain: Social Sciences

SDGs: Reduced inequalities, Decent work and economic growth, No poverty, Sustainable cities and communities

Open Access status: hybrid

Estimated APC paid: $3,000