Who is conducting the survey?
Leading this project is Dr. Mahmudur Fatmi, an Assistant Professor in Civil Engineering at UBC’s Okanagan campus. His research focuses on travel demand modelling, exploring the connections between transportation and land use, vehicle ownership, smart, shared and autonomous mobility services, behavioural analysis, and agent-based microsimulation.
Who can participate?
Residents of Okanagan and Metro Vancouver regions who received an invitation letter in the mail can participate. Moreover, anyone who is interested in participating can register to receive an access code here: click to register
Participation is invitation only and are randomly selected from the Okanagan or Metro Vancouver regions. All selected households should receive the invitation in their mail (which contains an invitation letter and an information page). You must be 18 years or above to respond. Questions will be asked about all household members 15 years and above. You can respond on behalf of your household members with their permission or ask them to complete their questions. You will be able to share the survey with your household members once you have started it.
The web-based consent form and web-based survey will be available, upon request, in Punjabi, Cantonese, Mandarin, and French. If you need translations, please send an e-mail to uitr.lab@ubc.ca with your request.
How will the data be used?
The collected data will fuel the creation of a pioneering modelling system, enhancing our ability to forecast travel behaviors, congestion, and emissions. Moreover, it will inform municipal planning and policy-making across the region. Information about where people are throughout the day allows us to understand how, where and why individuals travel, and what factors influence those choices. This information helps us to generate evidence on where to invest to make our transportation system more efficient, safe, economic and environmentally friendly.
How will my privacy be protected?
Your privacy is our priority!
– Your data will be kept confidential and anonymized.
– All information is securely stored in a password-protected UBC server in Canada.
– Sensitive information, such as your home address, will be coded, which means that any identifying information, such as residence location, will be coded and translated into variables, for example, distance to the closest bus stop or distance to the closest school. The coded data will be accessed by Dr. Fatmi’s team of approved researchers and other PI’s approved researchers.
-This detailed data will be used solely for research purposes by approved UBC researchers adhering to strict confidentiality agreements.
– An aggregated and coded version of the data will be made available to the public to assist in future research, planning and policymaking. Your responses will be combined with other responses in your area and cannot be traced back to you or any of your household members.
Should you wish to withdraw after completing the survey, please contact BC ATUS via our toll-free survey hotline at 778-200-8752 or email us at uitr.lab@ubc.ca within two weeks of completion.
How do I participate?
Participation is exclusively online via a website. You can respond to it using your smartphone, tablet, laptop, or desktop. After the web survey, you will be invited to participate in a smartphone app survey.
To begin the web survey, ensure you have your secure access code, found in the invitation letter’s bottom right corner. Visit https://bcatus.ok.ubc.ca, enter your access code, and start the survey.
Never share your secure access code beyond your household. If misplaced, reach out to BC ATUS’ toll-free survey hotline or email for assistance.
You can participate in the web-based survey up to December 22nd 2023.
Haven’t received an invitation in the mail?
If you have not received the invitation by mail but want to participate, register at https://bcatus.ok.ubc.ca/register.
What questions will I be asked?
The survey will ask questions about the daily activity log of all household members. This log includes activities at home (online shopping, remote work/schooling) and outside (shopping, work, gym, school) over a 24-hour period in the previous weekday. The day reported must be a weekday (i.e., Monday – Friday, excluding holidays), and all household members should be reporting for the same weekday. The survey will ask you to provide information about each place you have been, starting with your location at 3:00 am on your reported day and ending with your location at 2:59 am the following day. In addition, you will be asked about your socio-demographics and vehicle ownership information.
We are asking very specific information on your destinations to better understand how the built environment may affect the way people move around. For example, a transit stop within 200 m of a destination might encourage people to use transit more often. We wish to know your in-home and travel activities to understand how the tradeoff between the two is made, and how that impacts congestion and emissions.
Why is it important to know my in-home activities?
Our living choices directly influence our vehicle ownership decisions, impacting travel choices, distance, and carbon footprint. Given the interplay between at-home and outside activities, comprehending in-home activities is essential for predicting travel and emissions, especially considering evolving trends due to technology and the pandemic.
Why do I need to participate in a web-based and a smartphone survey?
The web survey collects activity data for a weekday, while the smartphone app collects data for a week (7 days including weekdays and weekends). The purpose for a weekday data is to understand the changing demand of a weekday, when typically, traffic congestion is severe. The purpose for a 7-day smartphone survey is to collect complex information on how individuals travel in a week, including weekends.
Although your participation is voluntary, we strongly encourage you to participate in both surveys. Your input is critical to accurately understand and predict travel demand.
What benefit can I gain from this survey?
Participants do not get any direct benefit from this survey. But your participation and accurate data will help to generate evidence on your travel choices, distance, and carbon footprint. This evidence will assist different levels of the government agencies such as cities and regional agencies, and transit agencies to develop transportation and land use plans and policies, and effectively invest in infrastructures. At the end of the study, participants will receive a link to the website where they will be able to compare their travel choices and carbon footprint with their neighbors, and explore ways to test the impact of alternative choices.
If you complete the web survey, you could win one $100 gift cards* (1-in-20 chance to win) or a $2,000 gift card. In addition, if you further participate in our smartphone app, you will receive up to $50 gift card** directly.
*The web survey gift cards are divided by region as follows:
- Ninety $100 gift cards plus one $2,000 gift card for Okanagan
- A hundred and thirty-five $100 gift cards plus one $2,000 gift card for Metro Vancouver
**The smartphone-based incentives will be done as follows:
Participants who fully complete the 7-day period using the app will get a $50 gift card.
Participants who fully complete 4 to 6 days will get $25 gift card.
Participants who only completes up to 3 days will not be eligible for any honoraria.
How long will the survey take?
The survey will take around 20 minutes to complete depending on the size of your household and the number of activities you participated in the reporting day.
Where can I find the results?
Upon completion of the project, we will email all the participants with a report and the website where they will be able to compare their travel behaviour and carbon footprint to others in the same neighborhood or region.
Survey results will be published in an aggregated form on the BC ATUS website at bcatus.ok.ubc.ca