Impact of Fuel Prices on Transport Behavior: A Case Study in Istanbul

Abstract

Traffic flow is an inescapable problem in almost all large cities around the world. Obviously, some social and economic factors make traffic congestion a serious and hard-solvable problem in reality. A key factor in recent years is a sharp increase in fuel prices in the international markets. However, how this price fluctuation affects traffic flows and transport behavior, mainly in large cities like Istanbul, is an important question to study. This study addresses the effect of fuel price changes on Istanbul's traffic flows. The primary purpose of this study is to understand the relation between fuel price variations and traffic flows in Istanbul, as well as other important factors that contribute to the congestion problem investigation. To do this, traffic data from the most crowded regions of Istanbul was first collected, and first the It was mainly observed that the gasoline prices in Istanbul have a significant impact on the traffic flows, and a unit increase in gasoline price reduces the flow rate between 3000 and 7000 units. In addition to the empirical results, a survey was conducted to identify additional factors that affect traffic flows. The survey aimed to investigate the transport behavior of drivers as fuel prices increase in Istanbul. According to the survey results, drivers tend to prefer using the public transportation network more as the gasoline price increases.