California Partners for Advanced Transportation Technology

This paper presents the findings of a survey conducted among callers of a San Francisco BayArea telephone information service. A Bay Area traveler information system, TravInfo, has beenin operation since September 1996. In April 1997, a survey of TravInfo callers was conductedover a two-week period. The paper compares the call making and demographic characteristics ofthose who asked for traffic information and of those who asked for transit information. Changesin travel behavior after the calls were made were also investigated. The key findings of the studywere that the people who called for traffic or transit information were satisfied with the service.About one-third of the people who made a trip after calling TravInfo modified their travelbehavior, of which the majority took an alternate route or changed their departure time. Therewas no significant difference between the call making characteristics and the demographicprofiles. A greater proportion of repeat TravInfo customers consisted of people who drive theirown vehicles and check on traffic conditions than of those who were inquiring about transitinformation.