CHANGES IN MOBILITY OF STUDENTS WITH A PUBLIC TRANSPORT PASS IN THE NETHERLANDS

The introduction of the Student Pass on 1-1-1991 for 600,000 students (giving unlimited travel on all public transport modes in the whole of the Netherlands) has several financial and operating consequences. It was conceived as a commercial contract: a means to reduce the level of public finance in the Ministry of Education and, for the operators, a source of extra revenue. The undertaking receives no financial support from the Ministry of Transport. At the 1992 PTRC Meeting, a paper (see IRRD 859691) was presented on the objectives of the evaluation study and the methodology used. The aim of this paper is to present the results and findings of the evaluation study. The comprehensive research programme has two major components: a longitudinal panel with 3320 students and a cross-sectional analysis with 1090 first year students. The students were asked to fill in a questionnaire and to complete a 3 days travel diary. The before and after surveys were carried out in the same period in November for three consecutive years 1990-1992. The report on the results of the 1990-1991 study was presented to the Dutch Parliament in November 1992. This paper will present the main findings of this report plus the results of analyses based on data collected in all three waves. Particular attention will be given to the effects of the Student Pass on public transport patronage (for different trip purposes and for different times of the day/week), modal split, car and driving licence ownerships and the choice of home address. Variations in impacts between regions and between types of education institutions have also been analysed to indicate whether differential patterns exist. (A) For the covering abstract see IRRD 866258.