Simultaneous modeling of individuals’ duration and expenditure decisions in out-of-home leisure activities

• Published in: Transportation research. Part A, Policy and practice Vol. 70; pp. 93 - 103
• Main Authors: Dane, Gamze, Arentze, Theo A., Timmermans, Harry J.P., Ettema, Dick
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier Ltd 01.12.2014
• Subjects: Activity-based model; Allocations; Decisions; Duration; Expenditure; Expenditures; Leisure activities; Mathematical analysis; Mathematical models; Money budget; Structural equation modeling; Time budget; Time measurements; Transportation; Activity-based model; Duration; Money budget; Structural equation modeling; Time budget; Expenditure
• ISSN: 0965-8564; 1879-2375
• DOI: 10.1016/j.tra.2014.10.003

•A new utility-based model of activity choice under time and money budget constraints.•The model allows flexible form of the utility function.•We show how parameters can be estimated using structural equation modeling.•The approach is applied to a large national dataset of leisure activities.•Results show that utility of expenditure increases with increasing duration and v.v. In this paper, we propose an activity model under time and budget constraints to simultaneously predict the allocation of time and money to out-of-home leisure activities. The proposed framework considers the activity episode level, given that the activity is scheduled. Thus, the model considers the decision of the quantities for duration and expenditure spent during the activity. We use a flexible utility function and show how the simultaneous equations can be estimated by using structural equations model (SEM) estimation techniques to handle the endogeneity problem of time and expenditure. The estimation results are based on a large national leisure diary data set collected in 2008 in the Netherlands, which provides detailed information about time and money spent as well as timing and location attributes of the activities. The analysis reveals that socio-demographics, travel party, timing and location variables influence the duration and expenditure of activity episodes. It shows that various socio-demographic groups display different preferences in terms of the time and money spent on activities. The results also indicate substitution relationships between spending more time and money for various activity categories. Thus it is concluded that the analysis provides useful results for a better understanding of combined time and money allocation decisions for leisure activities.