%0 Conference Paper
%A Cascajo Jiménez, Rocío
%A Farber, Steven
%A Jordá Lope, Pablo
%A Monzón de Cáceres, Andrés
%A Paez, Antonio
%B 12th World Conference on Transport Research 2010
%C Lisboa, Portugal
%D 2010
%F upm:7393
%I WCTR Society
%K Public transport; Spain; urban form; density; autocorrelation models
%T Urban form and bus riderships in Spanish cities
%U https://oa.upm.es/7393/
%X The effect of urban form on mobility is a question with important implications for  transportation and land use research and planning. A number of studies have investigated  the relationship between mobility and various indicators of urban form while controlling for  socio-economic characteristics. A majority  of these have been concerned with mobility by  private vehicles, although more recently there are also examples of research that explores  the relationship between urban form and the use of public transportation. The objective of  this paper is to investigate the demand for public transportation in a selection of cities in  Spain, from the perspective of urban form (density, metropolitan area, population ratios), and  other variables describing the characteristics  of public transport supply (density of network  and of stops), urban socio-economic profile, and competing and complementary modes  (metro, suburban train and auto ownership rates). The paper is based on aggregate bus  usage data collected for a number of Spanish cities and metropolitan areas for the years  2003-2007, and the use of autocorrelation models to account for intra-class correlations for  multi-year observations of metro areas/cities. The results of the analysis indicate that demand for public transport in Spain is related to the size and population density of the urban  area, the supply of bus routes, and the existence of a metro rail alternative. The results also  indicate the existence of substantial autocorrelation effects.