Background: Changes in modal choice is argued to be one way to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases. Increasing modal choices in favour of more environmentally friendly travel modes requires a better understanding of how these choices are actually made. The first aim of this study is therefore to examine how modal choice is related to subjective experiences as perceived accessibility, perceived satisfaction , habit, both before , after an intervention promoting public transport. The second aim is to examine how modal choice is affected by the intervention. Finally, the third aim is to examine how subjective experiences as perceived accessibility, perceived satisfaction, and habit are affected by the intervention.

Method: The design used is a before-and after-study with free public travel passes as the intervention (30-or 14-days free travel pass). Altogether, 52 travelers - distributed on two intervention groups and one control group - participated in the study. The 30-days free travel pass group constitutes 18 participants, the 14-days free travel pass group constitutes 19 participants while the control group constitutes 15 participants. During the before -period the participants were asked to register their modal choice using a digitalized application downloaded on their smart phones (the TravelVu app), to complete a short app-based questionnaire, and a web-based questionnaire. During the after-period, they were once again asked to register their modal choice and to complete a web-based questionnaire. All data collected were analyzed by variance or correlation analyses using the change between before-and after period as the dependent variable.

Conclusion: The intervention did not affect the modal choice or the subjective experiences. Over time, the participants did however increase their use of public transport and their cognitive evaluation of their everyday travel overall, while they decreased their use of car and became less reflective and less interested in trying out new alternative travel modes. These changes might be attributed to their participation in the present study.