Transportation Planning in Australia: Motorcycles and Motor Scooters

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1. Introduction
Motorcycles and motor scooters are a typically neglected method of travel in traffic and transport planning in Australia. As a result, there is a significant knowledge gap in the topic of interest as past research rarely consider motorcycles on equivalent terms to other travel modes. To understand motorcycle and motor scooter commuting there is a need for comprehensive data. The Australian Censuses ‘Journey to Work’ (JTW) data provides one source that enables analysis over time and across locations. This source of data has seldom been analysed for the context of motorcycle and motor scooter commuting in Australia.
The broad aim of this study is to enhance the understanding about motorcycle and motor scooter use. Motorcycles and motor scooters are a growing method of travel and it is imperative to be able to quantify and understand what is happening in Australia, particularly where these vehicles are being used for utilitarian rather than recreational travel. Although the use of motorcycles and scooters have high safety concerns, emphasis still needs to be put on the uses of this mode to enhance the limited knowledge on this topic.
The traditional approach to lowering congestion in cities is to increase the use of public transport. Motorcycles and motor scooters provide an opportunity to enhance urban mobility because of their smaller spatial footprint. A slight shift in traffic composition from private vehicles such as cars to motorcycles will significantly reduce traffic congestion (Yperman, 2011). Also, motorcycles and motor scooters have small engine capacities and as such result in much less fuel usage and emit lower greenhouse gases when compared to cars.
In this study, the aim is to identify the trends of mo...

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...rs fulfil these issues as they have advantageous traffic manoeuvrability and smaller engines which result in less fuel usage and less release of greenhouse gases. Most car trips contain just the driver, motorcycles and motor scooters transport the same amount of people but in a much smaller profile significantly reducing travel times and overall congestion. There is an increasing trend in registrations of motorcycles and scooters in Australia. The patterns of use of this mode differ between developed and developing countries. Riders in developed countries typically ride motorcycles or scooters for recreational uses and riders from developing countries use them primarily for utility purposes. However, a good proportion of riders in Australia use this mode to commute to work and as such needs to be analysed further with the use of JTW data in the following sections.

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