This book investigates the influence of self-organisation processes on the commuting of the poor workers in urban China. It suggests a new approach to investigate and measure individual access, and it argues that dynamic interactions between individual action and social structure influence individual’s access to transport, which cannot be measured using other traditional accessibility approaches.The overwhelming majority of models in transport research assume that socio-economic factors and the built-environment influence the accessibility of transport for individuals. This book provides evidence that individual decision-makings and actions are also vital factors to bring out changes in accessibility. Further, the study adopts a self-organisation process and structuration theory to illustrate that a significant proportion of travel problems of migrants are rooted in the interaction between actions and social structures. Any change in migrants’ actions or social structures in the self-organisation process would result in the production of complex and spontaneous travel behaviour. The self-organisation approach presented provides a new approach for urban transport planning in the future, particularly on the investigation of the accessibility of disadvantaged social groups. By using the social theories, transport research can have an effect on commuting behaviour and to improve poor workers’ quality of life.

This book focuses on the influence of socio-economic and land-use policies on the commuting problems and quality of life of the poor in Singapore and Hong Kong. It considers the influence of self-organisation: how the mobility of an individual is constituted by structures such as transport systems or socio-economic structural factors, as well as influenced by individual decisions. Where most transport studies focus on the influence of factors such as income inequality, the gender gap, and the built environment, this book fills a gap in paying particular attention to the influence of individual decisions on commuting. Given the prevalence of the former in research, government decision-makers are often constrained by these approaches and fail to understand the commuting problems of the poor. This book argues that the self-organisation approach provides some ideas that are outside the common conceptual framework in conventional transport planning and looks to improve mobility of lower-income commuters. Relevant to social science researchers working in areas such as urban planning and transport, mobility deprivation, and poverty, this book breaks new ground in quality of life studies in the Singapore and Hong Kong contexts.