Effects of the Built Environment and Socio-demographics on the Car and Two-Wheeler Ownership Levels: a Case Study of Dharwad City

Numerous studies have investigated the association between the built environment and household vehicle ownership from different geographical locations. However, empirical results reveal mixed effects, i.e., built environment effects vary across different geographical areas. These findings hint that the relevance of built environment measures to address vehicle ownership is questionable, at least in some geographical locations. Recently, many Indian cities have considered built environment measures—mixed-use development, transit-oriented development, etc.—to address vehicle ownership and travel demand. Given the economic transition, the aspiration to own and use vehicles, diverse household structure and family compositions, the built environment impacts on vehicle ownership decisions of Indian households’ needs investigation. Using primary travel behavior data from Dharwad city, Karnataka, India, the study estimates two separate ordered probit models of household car and two-wheeler ownership levels. Household socio-demographics, built environment attributes, and travel attitudes are input to the models. The study also compared the influences of objective and subjective land-use measures on household car and two-wheeler fleet size choices. The study findings are interesting. Improvements in neighborhood attractiveness and cleanliness would lead fewer household cars and two-wheelers. Additionally, an improvement in children-friendliness of neighborhoods contributes to fewer household cars. Population density was found to reduce household vehicle fleet size; however, road network density was positively correlated with household cars and motorcycles.