Analysing Qualitative Attributes of Freight Transport from Stated Orders of Preference Experiment

The research aims to estimate the relative importance and value for freight shippers of transport qualitative factors: service frequency, transport time, reliability of delivery, carrier's flexibility, and safety. A stated preference experiment with transport managers provided a sample of preference orders among hypothetical transport solutions. A conditional logit model adjusted for handling preference orders (Beggs et al., 1981) is applied to the sample and to subsamples according to transport distances, goods' values, and so on. This analysis shows that these qualitative factors play a significant role in the modal choice, and that their relative importance varies according to subsamples. © 2008 LSE and the University of Bath