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Mindset shift needed for cars not to remain preferred ride: NUS researchers

SINGAPORE — While having a train station within a 10-minute walk from their homes encourages more commuters to use the MRT as a primary mode of transport, having access to a car reduces this usage by 15.6 per cent.

SINGAPORE — While having a train station within a 10-minute walk from their homes encourages more commuters to use the MRT as a primary mode of transport, having access to a car reduces this usage by 15.6 per cent.

On the other hand, having accessible bus stops did not lead commuters to adopt buses as their main mode of transportation, with only 16.1 per cent of non-daily public transport users preferring to travel by bus.

These were some of the six key findings from a year-long study conducted by researchers from the National University of Singapore’s Institute of Systems Science, which was presented yesterday during a panel about transport mobility in cities at the Singapore International Transport Congress. The findings reinforce observers’ belief that the rail network will continue to be the preferred public transport mode among commuters here. The study, which is supported by the Land Transport Authority, aimed to discover how commuters make travel decisions and the factors which influences that influences their choices, such as convenience, time and cost. It also examined how commuters perceive public transport, and how this shapes usage patterns.

It was conducted from July last year and ended in August, using data gathered from field observations, interviews with transport operators, 1,500 survey responses and 47 focus-group participants.

Its principle investigator Dr Pallab Saha said that 37 per cent of commuters aged between 16 to 24 years old preferred cars as their transportation mode during peak hours, noting that owning a car has become “an aspirational symbol” associated with wealth. This is compared to 26 per cent of commuters in the age group of 35 to 54, and 18 per cent aged 55 and above, who indicated they preferred private transportation. The younger group also exhibited less eco-friendly attitudes as they would not be willing to cut back on car use to reduce their carbon footprint.

Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the panel, he said that more awareness and education is necessary a for mindset shift to “decouple car ownership and car access”, adding that a study is being planned to look into car-ownership behaviour.

“We have to address the mindset so that cars no longer remain as the preferred mode ... All you need is access to a car, you don’t have to own a car,” he said.

As such, he felt that “there is scope for improvements” in providing alternatives such as car sharing and car pooling, but acknowledged that it would take time to instil a change.

“It’s not going to happen in the next one to two years, because this is not dealing with the physical infrastructure or hardware, this is dealing with the mental models,” he said.

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