About the Project

How do people perceive and understand their transit journeys? What are their in-the-moment thoughts and observations? What are things they like and dislike about transit? What features make their trips easier or more pleasant? What elements pose challenges for riders?

This project used visual data, specifically photographs, to examine people's experiences as they navigate the public transit networks of Los Angeles. We asked participants to gather pictures of the things most important to them on their transit trips using their own, and now nearly ubiquitous, digital cameras, smart phones, or camera phones. They were to consider transit trips as door-to-door trips and not just time spent on vehicles. Therefore, trips may have included travel to and from stops or stations, wait times, and if they made one or more stops between an origin and destination, other activities that occurred while not on a bus or train.

Participants uploaded their photos to a website where they provided demographic information as well as details about their trip, including start/end locations, time of travel, route, operator, trip purpose, transfers, and their familiarity with the route. They also had the opportunity to caption each photo, add more descriptive text, and provide commentary about the trip overall and anything they were not able to capture in a photograph.

We analyzed these rider-generated travelogues to understand transit travel from the perspective of users. Four major themes emerged from the data: (1) riders define the spatial and temporal boundaries of their trips in different ways, (2) the physical elements of transit systems and surrounding areas are salient to users, (3) system legibility and wayfinding features can greatly facilitate or complicate transit trips, and (4) people are aware of the social aspects of their transit journeys. The findings from this pilot study suggest that transit planners and managers concerned with people's decisions whether or not to travel by public transit need to consider aspects of the transit experience that reach well beyond the bus or train door.

Camille N.Y. Fink and Brian D. Taylor from the UCLA Department of Urban Planning and the UCLA Institute of Transportation Studies conducted this project with a grant from the University of California Transportation Center (UCTC).

Norman Wong from the UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies designed and developed the website.

About the Researchers

Camille Fink is a PhD student in the UCLA Department of Urban Planning. Her interests include qualitative methods in transportation research, transportation equity, the built environment, the sociology of public space, and transportation safety and security. Her dissertation work involves the use of ethnographic fieldwork to understand behavior, culture, and social norms on buses in Los Angeles. She has a BA in sociology from UC Davis and an MA in urban planning from UCLA.

Brian Taylor, AICP, is Professor and Chair of Urban Planning and Director of the Institute of Transportation Studies at UCLA. His research examines the politics of transportation planning and finance, and the demographics of travel behavior. His current work examines: equity in transportation finance, measuring users' perceptions of public transit, alternative ways to measure congestion, and the influence of travel mode on cognitive mapping of opportunities.