ANALYTIC MODELS OF TRIP LENGTH DISTRIBUTIONS

This paper develops analytic models of trip length distributions. The models are derived from a destination choice model for a range of assumptions about the distributions of transportation level-of-service attributes and opportunities over the urban space. These models include all previously reported analytic trip length distributions. Their derivation from an explicit model of individual choice behavior illuminates their underlying assumptions about the urban space. It is shown how the parameters of the derived trip length distributions can be interpreted and estimated from available data that include estimated parameters of travel demand models and other readily available statistics on average speeds and fuel consumption. This makes these models useful for simplified analyses of various urban transportation policies, especially areawide pricing and travel time changes. (Author)