The life and death of residential dissonants in transit-oriented development: a discrete time survival analysis

Residential dissonants, residents who are not satisfied with land use patterns in their neighbourhood, are a threat to transit-oriented development (TOD) policy because of their unsustainable transport choices. However, it is not known if their level of dissatisfaction is reduced in TODs, and if so, the time duration it takes. This study tracks dissonance status of 98 TOD residents using five waves of panel data spanning over nine years from Brisbane, Australia. The residents were classified into TOD dissonant and TOD consonant (opposite of dissonants) groups and a discrete time survival analysis technique was applied to identify time-to-event for these groups. An event was recorded if a dissonant became a consonant, or vice versa. Two discrete time hazard models were estimated using binary logistic regression analysis (one for each transition) to identify socio-demographic and built environment characteristics associated with the occurrence of an event. Results showed that about 46% of the TOD residents were dissonants at baseline. The survival functions were significantly different between dissonant and consonant classes. About half of the dissonants took-on the characteristics of consonants in just four years. In contrast, TOD consonants remained consonants relatively longer (median survival duration is 9 years). Groups that were likely to become dissonants were those with low educational status, and people born overseas. The findings suggest that TODs have an autonomous effect on changing attitudes over time, which verifies the ‘reverse causality’ hypothesis, and therefore, TODs are likely to be dissonant free naturally presumably as residents experience the benefits of TOD living. The process could be sped up with targeted policy interventions (e.g., concessionary travel card, rent relief to bear the high cost of living in TODs) for those being as, or likely to be susceptible to become dissonant.