SPATIAL VARIABILITY OF ACCESSIBILITY TO PRIVATE/PERSONAL CARS IN BENIN METROPOLIS, NIGERIA.

ABSTRACT

Studies have shown that there is spatial variability in the proportion of personal car ownership as well as varying factors responsible for willingness of people to own their personal means of transportation. This study was therefore conducted to examine spatial variability of accessibility to private/personal cars in Benin metropolis, Nigeria. The aim was to examine the spatial variation in the proportion of household population with access to private car in the study area. The study adopted the cross-section survey design, with the study area treated in three zones of inner, intermediate and outer zones. Thereafter, five communities were randomly selected from each zone making a total of fifteen communities for the study. The study employed both descriptive and inferential statistics in analysing the data generated through administration of questionnaire to the sampled respondents while Analysis of Variance, Point Bisera correlation and Chi-square were used test the stated hypotheses. The result showed that there is a significant relationship between distance from the city center (inner zone) to the periphery (outer zone) and the number of households with personal cars in the study area. Thus, it was reported that there are more households with personal cars in the intermediate zone than the inner zone, just as it was discovered that more households in the outer zone own personal cars than those in the intermediate area of the metropolis. The study also shows that factor such as marital status, household size, distance to places of socioeconomic activities and level of income were major factors identified as factors responsible for ownership of personal cars in the study area. The study recommend that government invest in public transportation in the study area. This is in view of the fact that most people in the study area have no personal car but rely on public transportation for their mobility. It is also recommended that government provide the enabling environment to individual that will facilitate their ability to have their personal means of mobility which is a necessity or better still, invest mass transit of public transportation that will encourage people to abandon personal cars.