Structural Equation Modelling for Analysing Passengers’ Perceptions about Railway Services

In this work a tool for analysing passengers’ perceptions in terms of satisfaction with transit services is proposed. Specifically,a structural equation model is formulated to explore the impact of the relationship between global customer satisfaction andservice quality attributes, such as safety, cleanliness, main and additional services, information, and personnel. We analyse theservices offered by rail operators in the Northern Italy; specifically, 32 regional lines and 9 suburban lines connectingdifferent towns of the hinterland of the city of Milan, and 2 express lines connecting Milan with the Malpensa airport areanalysed. To calibrate the model, data collected in a survey addressed to a sample of more than 16,000 passengers are used.The survey was conducted in June 2011.The proposed model can be useful both to transport agencies and planners to analyze the correlation between service qualityattributes and identify the most convenient attributes for improving the supplied service. The main findings are that servicecharacteristics like punctuality, regularity and frequency of runs, and cleanliness have the highest positive effect on servicequality. While also comfort and information have a notable positive effect, personnel and safety have a not very considerableeffect.