Journal of Korean Society of TransportationISSN:1229-1366(Print) 2234-4217(Online)대한교통학회

The purpose of this study is to discuss how to improve the social acceptability of self-driving shuttles by analyzing the factors influencing the social acceptability of self-driving shuttles and the willingness of passengers to pay fares based on the evaluation conducted after boarding a Zero Shuttle. From November 15 to November 17, 2018 (three days), an evaluation of the Zero Shuttle, Korea’s first automated means of public transportation, was conducted on ninety-five passengers who were members of the general public. The method of evaluation was performing two surveys, once before and once after boarding. The pre-boarding survey asked questions about passenger attributes and matters related to the means of transport used by passengers, and the post-boarding survey comprises an evaluation on boarding the Zero Shuttle, impressions before and after boarding the shuttle, and matters related to the social acceptability of a automated-driving shuttle. Analysis was conducted on 94 suitable samples. First of all, we analyzed the influence factors with the intention to use the Zero Shuttle when it is commercialized and the extent of increase in social acceptability from the operation of the Zero Shuttle as the dependent variables using the ordered logit model. As a result of the model analysis, the fares a person would pay to use the shuttle and the time of commercialization of automated-driving vehicles were adopted as the explanatory variables in both models. The higher the fares intended to be charge for the use of the shuttle, the closer the time of commercialization of automated-driving vehicles became, and the more the surveyed person contemplated, the higher their intention to use the Zero Shuttle at the time of commercialization became, and the higher the increase in social acceptability resulting from the operation of the Zero Shuttle became. The survey was divided into two types which were ‘shuttle bus’ and ‘call service’. The dependent variable of the shuttle fare model was divided into two types based on the basic bus fare of KRW 1,300 buses, and the dependent variable of the call service was based on the basic taxi fare of KRW 3,000. The analysis model analyzed the binary logit model used when the dependent variable was binary. As a result of model analysis, passengers with administrative/office/management occupations were found to evaluate fares intended to be charged for use of the shuttle more highly.