The Impact of Public Transport Subsidy on Social Inclusion: The Case of Free Train Policy in Thailand

Abstract

According to growing policy awareness of the relationship between transport disadvantage and social exclusion, free train policy was launched and funded by the Thai government to provide an alternative of public transportation for low-income. Then, the main objective of this study was to systematically evaluate the impact of free train policy on promoting social inclusion in Thailand. After the intercept interviews with 392 free train users, econometric model was developed to examine the impact of public transport subsidy on social inclusion. It was shown by the model that free train persuaded 32.65 percent of passengers to travel more frequently for participating more social activities. The beneficial group was the low income citizen with monthly income less than 6,518 Baht. However, 40.31 percent of free train users was not low-income, but gained unintended benefit from this policy.