Travel characteristics and commuting pattern among residents of Lagos metropolis, Nigeria: An Assessment

Abstract

Urban travel is not solely on travel alone, but on people’s participation in activities and how this is done. The intra-city trips undertaken during weekdays comprises those which occurred from Monday to Friday which are the official working days while weekends trips comprises those undertaken on Saturdays and Sundays are off their officials duty post. Data were collected .from primary and secondary sources. A survey design was adopted. The study sample consisted of 2,500 households in Lagos metropolis. . The questionnaire was administered in direct proportion to the population size of each of Local Government Areas (LGAs). Systematic sampling technique was used to select every tenth building on the identified streets. In a multi-family dwelling, random sampling was used to select one household. The household head or his/her representative was interviewed on intra-city trip patterns of the household. The data collected were analyzed using simple frequency count.  lt is observed that more than 95% of residents depends on the road while relative proportion (less than 5%) of residents depends on other modes (i.e. Rail and Ferry) of transport.   Work and business trips characterized the weekdays while social, shopping and recreation trips dominated during the weekends. The distance covered in kilometer for any of the trips (work, business, social, shopping and recreation) averaged 5km radius. Whereas, 35.5% of the respondents used commercial vehicles, 29.5% used private vehicles, while 20.0% used official vehicles. Another 7.8%, 5.2%, 2.0% of the respondents used motorcycle, ferry and rail respectively. The implication of this situation is the presence of too many vehicular traffic on the roads during the peak periods leading to congestion and loss of valuable man-hours in the Lagos metropolis.. It is therefore recommended that transport planners in Lagos need to develop alternative intra-city transport systems. This can be achieved through a shift to the development of other land transport systems by policy makers.

 Key Words: Travel patterns, Intra-city trips, Residents, Policy makers, Lagos