Design and development of a stated choice experiment for interdependent agents: accounting for interactions between buyers and sellers of urban freight services

Stated choice experiments have proven to be a powerful tool in eliciting preferences across a broad range of choice settings. This paper outlines the elements of a group-based experiment designed for interdependent urban freight stakeholders, along with the procedure to administer the questionnaire sequentially. The focus is on the design of a computer-assisted personal survey instrument and the value in disseminating the details of a new approach to design and collect stated choice data for interacting agents. The paper also discusses how to specify a reference alternative, and then how to recruit appropriate real-market or representative decision-making group members to participate in a subsequent phase of the survey, which incorporates the reference alternative and contextual information from an initial phase. The empirical strategy, set out in some detail, provides a new framework within which to understand more fully the role that specific attributes, such as variable user charges, influencing freight distribution chains might play, and who in the supply chain is affected by specific attributes in terms of willingness to pay for the gains in distribution efficiency.