The impact of perceived safety on public transport route choice across the day

Abstract

Public transport (PT) is a key component of sustainable urban mobility. While the effect of perceived safety on satisfaction has been widely studied, its impact on actual passenger behaviour remains largely unexplored. This study combines observed route choices from smart card data in Eastern Denmark with responses from a large-scale survey of 3,583 train passengers to examine how perceived station safety influences route choice. Discrete choice models estimated separately for morning and evening trips show that safety has a significant behavioural impact, equivalent to a perceived reduction of approximately 6–10 minutes of bus in-vehicle time. Demographic interactions reveal no significant differences between men and women, whereas young adults display varying sensitivity to safety throughout the day. Overall, the findings highlight the importance of perceived safety in shaping route choice within multi-modal PT networks.