VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY MO MO ME KO USERS’ INTENTION OF ROUTE CHOICE ON TOLL ROADS: CASE STUDIES IN VIETNAM MASTER’S THESIS VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY MO MO ME KO USERS’ INTENTION OF ROUTE CHOICE ON TOLL ROADS: CASE STUDIES IN VIETNAM MAJOR: CIVIL ENGINEERING CODE: 8900201.04 QTD RESEARCH SUPERVISOR: Assoc. NGUYEN HOANG TUNG Hanoi, 2023 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This study would not have been able to be completed without the various contributions of several people. I would like to express my gratitude to everyone who supported and assisted me in many ways in order to complete my thesis. First and foremost, I would like to express sincere appreciation to my supervisor, Assoc.
Nguyen Hoang Tung for giving me numerous helpful ideas and advice, continuous motivation and supervision, patience and constant support. I got a good memory and remembrance of his patiently guiding and directing me and keeping me on the right track in my study. I also would like to express my gratitude from the bottom of my heart to Professor Hironori Kato and Professor Shinichi Takeda for giving me their precious time, patience, insightful suggestions, enthusiastic encouragement, immense knowledge and aspiring guidance with a systematic approach, which not only helped to improve the entire quality of my thesis but also supported my further studies and professional career. I wish to extend my special thanks to Professor Nguyen Dinh Duc not only for his lectures and valuable knowledge but also for providing opportunities to study at Vietnam Japan University (VJU).
I am also grateful to Japan-ASEAN Integration Fund (JAIF) organization for fully funding my Master‟s Degree in Civil Engineering Program at VJU. Moreover, I would like to convey my sincere gratitude to Dr. Nguyen Tien Dung and Dr. Nguyen Ngoc Vinh, who have always provided me with insightful lectures, great suggestions and care while I studied and finished the thesis.
I would like to extend great thanks to my senior, Mr. Bui Van Tuan for letting me use data in the thesis. Besides, I am grateful to all VJU family including the program assistants for their enthusiastic support throughout my VJU journey. Additionally, I would like to appreciate my friends being with me in difficult times.
Last but not least, none of my efforts would have been possible without my lovely father, mother and two elder sisters who always catch me when I fall and encourage me to pursue the best version of myself. I would like to offer them my sincere appreciation for their unequivocal love, care and most importantly for believing in me. All in all, I would like to express my warmest thanks to everyone who has supported me throughout my academic years. ABSTRACT Transport infrastructure especially toll road development plays an important role to increase the country‟s economic activities.
Therefore, governments especially from developing countries always invite private investors for toll road projects to improve the road quality. This is because toll roads can improve service quality, reduce traffic congestion and promote equitable development between regions not only for government and private investors but for road users also. However, there are many toll road projects that fail to support adequate service for road users in two cases including a case in which new toll roads often compete with existing non-toll roads, and the other case in which private investors do not understand well about users‟ preferences. Therefore, route choice behaviour is necessary to understand the knowledge of users‟ preferences for successful toll-road investment.
Although toll roads have been widely studied in the past, there is still little research on the relationship between service quality and route choice. Moreover, the competition between toll and non-toll roads in a route choice was not considered in most of the previous studies. To fill these gaps, this study investigated two cases of competition including a case in which toll and non-toll roads are parallel (no shared section) and the other case in which there is a shared section of the two types, and bivariate probit model is performed to compare dependent binary choices between toll and non-toll roads collecting data from Hanoi, Vietnam. The results revealed that in the non-shared section case, road users highly evaluating toll road's safety system, more satisfied with road usage price, and more dependent on route-finding applications have higher willingness to use toll roads than non-toll roads.
These factors, however, were not found in the shared section case. Only individuals highly evaluating toll road surface conditions prefer using toll roads in the shared section case. This study highlights the crucial significance that the competition context plays in supporting users choose their utility function while deciding their route choice. Therefore, the related policies based on the competition context are recommended to improve future toll road projects.
Keywords: route choice, toll and non-toll roads, bivariate binary probit model, developing country. Contents LIST OF TABLES .i LIST OF FIGURES .ii CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION. Statement of the Problems. Overview of the Study.
4 CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW. PPP Projects in Transportation. Overview of Route Choice on Toll Roads. Route Choice Rule.
Factors Influence on Route Choice. Relationship between Road Services Quality and Route Choice. Summary of Previous Route Choice Studies. Description of Information.
Field Survey Results. Bivariate Binary Probit Model. 24 CHAPTER 4 DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION. Socio-demographic Characteristic of Respondents.
Ratio of travel cost to total income. Aspect of Route Choice Behaviour Related to Service Quality. Quality and Comfort. Aspect of Route Choice Behaviour Related to Users‟ Travel Characteristics.
Role of Road in Daily Life. Puropose to Use Road. Attitude toward Road Use Fee. Applications when Choosing Route.
Results for Pair-1 and Pair-2. Discussion and Conclusion. Suggestion for Further Studies. 58 LIST OF TABLES Table 1.
Vietnam: International Ranking of Infrastructure. Categorization of Factors Affecting Route Choice. Summay of Previous Route Choice Studies. Field Survey Information.
Data Collection Information. Route Choice Behaviour Related to Service Quality (%). Route Choice Behaviour Related to Users‟ Travel Characteristics (%). Final selection of 36 Variables through the First Step.
39 i LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1. Quality of Road Infrastructure in ASEAN Countries. Flow of Research. Number of PPPs Project in Each Sector.
Number of Transport Sub-Sector Projects Sector. Flow Diagram of Choice Rule. Data Collection from Local People. Ratio of Travel Cost to Total Income.
Safety System/ Design in Pair-1. Condition of Toll Road Surface in Pair-1 (Photo from Field Survey). Condition of Non-Toll Road Surface in Pair-2 (Photo from Field Survey). Toll Gate in Pair-1.
Toll Gate in Pair-2. VMS LED signs source: fine pixel led in Japan. Factors Affecting Route Choice on Toll Road. Background All socio-economic interactions are based on transportation, which is a significant component of human activity.
Among the various types of transportation, road transport is one of the most important components (Santos et. According to numerous studies (Wang and Pfister, 2008; Park et., 2019), the development of road transport creates employment opportunities, improves economic activity, and has a number of other positive effects on the local population. However, a growing economy and population in many developing nations are creating an excessive demand for road infrastructure (Oxford Business Group, 2018). As a result, pressure is increasing as inadequate road infrastructure hinders foreign investments in nations that depend on them to improve their economic performance and competitiveness (Ahukannah et al., 2003; Ivanova and Masarova, 2013).1 below shows the quality of road infrastructure in ASEAN countries.
7=extensive 7 Among top performers and efficient Around the 6 world average among the best Despite improvements, in the world 5 ranking remain low World Average 4 1=extremely 3 underdeveloped 2 among the worst in the world 1 Laos Cambodia Malaysia Thailand Brunia Philippines Singapore Vietnam Indonesia Myanmar 2014 2019 Figure 1. Quality of Road Infrastructure in ASEAN Countries (Source: World Bank, Global Competitiveness Report 2014, 2019) In order to reduce the pressure on the public sector debt while also expanding and improving public facilities, governments have invited the private sectors for financing both locally and internationally to enter into long-term contractual agreements that 1 may take the form of construction or management of public sector infrastructure facilities by the private sector entity, or the provision of services (using infrastructure facilities) to the community (Grimsey and Lewis, 2002). Therefore, toll roads, which are the commercial and private provision of transport infrastructure, have received increasing attention in recent years, and the system is being used to finance new road networks in developing as well as developed countries (Lai et al. The development of toll roads also brings many benefits such as enhancing road user services (Karsaman and Weningtyas, 2015; Karpushko et al., 2021), reducing traffic congestion (Hansen, 2001; Low and Odgers, 2012) and promoting regional development that is equitable (Siswoyo, 2020).
In certain circumstances, commuters and other frequent travellers choose a competitive road network to avoid paying tolls. When the nearby roads are not built for high transport demand, this fact not only results in toll revenue losses but also in congestion and safety issues. Considering the above, special attention should be paid to the analysis of the variables that influence road users‟ route choice (Politis et al. One of the most intricate and difficult tasks in traffic assignment is route choice.
The sophisticated nature of human behaviour, the ambiguity of the decision-making process, and the stochasticity of people's preferences are some of the variables contributing to the complexity of this process (Zhang and Levinson, 2010), and it supports designers in better understanding consumer needs and optimizing their creations (Zhao, 2016). Statement of the Problems The quality of the roads in Vietnam has one of the lowest rankings among the main infrastructure sectors, according to the Global Competitiveness Report from 2008- 2009 (Table 1. It is obvious that Vietnam still faces a number of issues and difficulties in its efforts to build its transport infrastructure, particularly its road system. According to the Vietnam National Assembly's supervision committee, there were 55 PPP toll road projects in operation as of 2016 with a combined investment of 2 almost $6 billion.
Since Vietnam's recently opened budget, there have been numerous issues and difficulties (Business Information Centre, 2018). However, many toll roads have still failed to improve the services in the operation stage. This may be because of new toll roads often compete with existing non-toll roads, and the investors fail to understand users‟ preferences. Therefore, knowledge on users‟ preferences of toll roads is essential for successful toll-road investment, and private sector participation in public infrastructure and facility services should be promoted.
Vietnam: International Ranking of Infrastructure International Competitive Ranking Advantages(+)/ Disadvantages(-) Quality of overall infrastructure 97 Quality of port infrastructure 112 - Quality of electricity supply 104 - Quality of roads 102 - Quality of air transport infrastructure 92 - Quality of railroad infrastructure 66 - Available seat kilometers 42 + Telephone line 37 + Country Competitiveness Index Rank 70 Source: World Economic Forum, Global Competitiveness Report 2008-2009 1. Research Questions For the above purposes, the research question with this study is what factors affect users‟ choice of toll roads? 1. Objectives The specific objectives of the study are as follow: 1. To analyze users‟ choice behaviors of routes including toll roads 2.
To identify major factors affecting the users‟ choice of toll roads 3. To discuss the implications from findings to toll-road policy 3 1. Overview of the Study This study is organized and presented in five chapters. Chapter 1: Introduction The research background, statement of the problems, and objectives of the study including research questions will be mentioned.
Chapter 2: Literature Review Chapter 2 will show some existing research papers related to this thesis‟s topic. The factors influencing route choice will be pointed out from those previous papers, especially on toll road studies.