Abstract:
Lahore, the most populated city of Punjab is expanding particularly on southern side due to migration of people from all over the province. Along with other different problems; Traffic problems are also generating due to expansion of city. Literature from worldwide suggest that city should be planned in such a way that promotes public transport usage which offers more capacity and eventually result in lower traffic problems. The aim of this research is to investigate urban form of Lahore and its relationship with public transport usage. Urban form refers to density, diversity and design of an area or a city. For this, different urban form variables were computed for the city of Lahore and maps at town and union council level to explore the urban form of Lahore were generated. To develop the relationship for urban form and social variables with public transport usage in Lahore, Ordinary Least Square and Simultaneous Auto regression have been used. After assessment of all urban form variables by using maps, it is concluded that Lahore is monocentric at town level whereas bridging towards sprawl at union council level. Further investigation has been made at union council level. A significant relationship was also found to exist between urban form and social variables with public transport usage of the city. Out of six urban form variables, Entropy Index, Employment Density and Accessibility Index to Employment found statistically significant to explain the public transport usage. On other side, households having no car, households having size less than 6, young females having age less than 30 years and households having transport expense less than 5,000 are social variables which have significant effect on usage of public transport at union council level. Further, Spatial lag parameter was found to be statistically significant which shows that public transport usage in the city has neighborhood influence at Union Council level. Overall, the research shows that there is a strong relationship between urban from variables and public transport usage in Lahore yet the analysis of many more cities at union council level is needed in support of order to validate this claim in local context.
