Working on the train: from ‘dead time’ to productive and vital time

The conventional approach to the study of travel time is to see it as ‘dead time’, i.e. time that should be minimized. In this paper, we study time-use on trains, especially in relation to the use of information and communication technology for work purposes. The empirical results are based on a survey of rail travellers in Norway in 2008. It was found that a high proportion of ordinary commuters and business people work on board while travelling by train, i.e. 35 % of commuters and 43 % of business people. Nearly every fourth commuter gets their travel time approved as working hours. Most respondents had some sort of electronic device with them on board, and 25 % travelling for work-related purposes use a laptop computer. Only 10 % report that their travel time is of no use. Knowledge of how travel time is utilized is indispensable in the discussion about the evaluation of travel time in cost-benefit analysis. The use of travel time can also be important for choice of transport mode in the assessment of travel time versus work options.

[1]  H. Couclelis.  From Sustainable Transportation to Sustainable Accessibility: Can We Avoid a New Tragedy of the Commons? , 2000 .

[2]  K. Mason.  FUTURE TRENDS IN BUSINESS TRAVEL DECISION MAKING , 2002 .

[3]  E. Laurier.  Doing Office Work on the Motorway , 2004 .

[4]  John Urry,et al.  Moving Methods, Travelling Times , 2008 .

[5]  Harold Schweizer,et al.  On Waiting , 2005 .

[6]  Carsten Sørensen,et al.  Digital nomads and mobile services , 2002 .

[7]  Patricia L. Mokhtarian,et al.  MODELING EMPLOYEES' PERCEPTIONS AND PROPORTIONAL PREFERENCES OF WORK LOCATIONS: THE REGULAR WORKPLACE AND TELECOMMUTING ALTERNATIVES. IN: TRANSPORT AND INFORMATION SYSTEMS , 2000 .

[8]  Carrie R. Leana.  The Corrosion of Character: The Personal Consequences of Work in the New Capitalism , 1998 .

[9]  P. Sweezy,et al.  Cars and Cities , 1973 .

[10]  Glenn Lyons,et al.  The Use of Travel Time by Rail Passengers in Great Britain , 2007 .

[11]  Xinyu Cao,et al.  How do individuals adapt their personal travel? A conceptual exploration of the consideration of travel-related strategies , 2005 .

[12]  A. Glebbeek.  The corrosion of character , 2000 .

[13]  Peter Collett,et al.  Driving Passion: The Psychology of the Car , 1987 .

[14]  David Banister,et al.  The sustainable mobility paradigm , 2008 .

[15]  Christa Hubers,et al.  ICT and temporal fragmentation of activities: An analytical framework and initial empirical findings , 2008 .

[16]  Steve Whittaker,et al.  Mobile technologies in mobile spaces: Findings from the context of train travel , 2008, Int. J. Hum. Comput. Stud..

[17]  Nobuaki Ohmori,et al.  How Different Are Activities While Commuting By Train? A Case In Tokyo , 2008 .

[18]  Dick Ettema,et al.  Fragmentation of work activity as a multi-dimensional construct and its association with ICT, employment and sociodemographic characteristics , 2010 .

[19]  Peter van der Waerden,et al.  Extent, Nature, and Covariates of Multitasking of Rail Passengers in an Urban Corridor , 2009 .

[20]  H. Moorhouse.  American Automobiles and Workers' Dreams , 1983 .

[21]  Stephen G. Ritchie,et al.  STOCHASTIC MODELING AND REAL-TIME PREDICTION OF VEHICULAR LANE-CHANGING BEHAVIOR , 2001 .

[22]  J. Urry,et al.  Travel time use in the information age , 2005 .

[23]  Arlie Russell Hochschild,et al.  The Time Bind: When Work Becomes Home and Home Becomes Work , 1997 .

[24]  D. Metz.  The Myth of Travel Time Saving , 2008 .

[25]  Donald G. Janelle,et al.  Information, Place, and Cyberspace , 2000 .

[26]  Barbara Lenz,et al.  The Changing Allocation of Activities in Space and Time by the Use of ICT—“Fragmentation” as a New Concept and Empirical Results , 2007 .

[27]  Ilan Salomon,et al.  How Derived is the Demand for Travel? Some Conceptual and Measurement Considerations , 2001 .