Research on the relationship between the demand for suburban bus transport and the number of registered passenger cars in the Slovak Republic

University of Zilina, Faculty of Operation and Economics of Transport and Communications, Univerzitna 1, 010 26 Zilina, Slovakia

^* corresponding author: maria.bridzikova@fpedas.uniza.sk

Abstract

In recent years a trend of increasing individual car transport is seen in the traffic at the expense of public passenger transport. This adverse development has negative effects on the environment and human health as well. This manuscript aims to prove the declining demand for bus transport in individual self-governing regions in the Slovak Republic and at the same time the increase in the share of individual car transport. The increase in individual car transport has, above all, a negative impact on passenger demand for ordinary fares, as the population has the choice of using the services of a particular operator or their own passenger car to make their journeys. From the side of government or individual self-governing regions as contracting authority of transport services must be an effort to reverse this unfavorable situation, as the number of registered passenger cars is one of the important factors that affects the demand for suburban bus transport. The authorities can support suburban bus transport in front of the individual car transport through strategic documents such as „Strategic plan for the development of public passenger transport”.