Abstract:
Men and women travel behaviours are different during the joumev to work from their home.
Men travel more length of travel and tend to work more days in a week than that of women.
Study on men and women travellers’ behaviour at transit is important since it reveals the
demand of passenger attraction and generation of bus travels, the nature of transit travels that
it tempoial or permanent, directions of travel demands start from and to end. purposes of
travel, modes of travel to reach the transit and to leave, and choice of the travel
These details can be used for bus route planning and scheduling works.
routes etc.
The study conducted at selected bus passenger transit towns in Colombo Metropolitan Area
(CMA). These are categorized in to three transport zones such as; Zone 1: Colombo city
limits area, Zone 2: Colombo peripheral area, and Zone 3: Colombo suburban area with
considering the number of plying bus routes per square km of area. At each bus to bus transit
location, bus traveller boarding counts were collected for 12-hour bus operational period in a
day and simultaneously, travel behaviour data was collected by interviewing randomly a bus
traveller who waited for a travel at transit during the survey period. The random sample was
represented at 95% level of confidence and the bus traveller age varies between 20 and 50
years. It was assumed that this category of age represents a majority of employed bus
travellers in the study area.
The survey revealed that about 0.75 million of transit bus travellers travels daily in CMA. Of
them, 53 % of travellers reach to a transit location by bus, ->8% by walking and the balance
by a vehicle. The travel origins observed that on average 46% of travellers start journey from
home, 26% from work place, 11% from a social event, 10% from school and 7% from
Business. The travel destinations observed that on average 43% of passengers’ travel to
home, 28% to work place, 13% to a social event, 7% to school and 9% to Business. It also
revealed that 65% of bus travellers create Home Based Worked Trips (HBWT): of them; 69%
of men and 31% of women, and 35% of bus travellers create Non-Home Based Worked Trips
(NHBWT): of them, 55% of men and 45% of women. Finally, it is concluded that men create 21% more bus transit trips per day on their way to work place than that of women in
Colombo Metropolitan Area.
