Daily Mobility of University Students. Case of the Faculty of Architecture of the Central University of Ecuador

Abstract

One of the issues that are permanently and increasingly on the metropolitan and local governments of Latin America agenda is urban mobility. This is due to its implications on efficiency, productivity and competitiveness of the city (WBCSD, 2013; UN-Habitat, 2015) as well as in the quality of life of its inhabitants, especially in relation to health and leisure (Miralles, 2010).

In particular, Quito, the capital of Ecuador, has a set of variables that have hindered the management of urban mobility. This has affected all inhabitants, especially in their commute to work and school-. On this paper we will focus on the problem that university students have to commute. For this investigation the Faculty of Architecture of the Universidad Central Del Ecuador (UCE) has been taken as a case study. Central University Universidad Central Del Ecuador brings together more than 30% of students from Pichincha province, around 47,700 students.

The problem is generated because of the location of Universidad Central Del Ecuador and its Faculty of Architecture. It is located in the city’s Hipercentro, which houses the twelve universities that the Metropolitan District of Quito (DMQ) has, and where daily 159 thousand students commute to.

In addition to universities, there are businesses and urban facilities, where multitudes of citizen’s have to commute, generating 60% of public transportation and 40% of private transportation journeys (DMQ, 2014). On the other hand, in territorial terms, Quito has a linear city morphology of 42 km long and only 4 km wide (Cuenin & Silva, 2010), which extends from north to south. Therefore, Quito has a limited road network generating constant traffic and congestion problems. The DMQ public transport infrastructure consists of three axes: The Ecovía, the Trolebus, the Metrobús and soon Quito’s subway, these three transportation systems are interconnected to transport Quito’s cities’ from north to south.

In that context, the objective of this paper is to analyze that urban morphology, mobility infrastructure and the location of the UCE; affect students from different socioeconomic status of the faculty of architecture in their everyday displacement. These case study corresponds to a part of the doctoral thesis work called Lifestyles and everyday mobility in university students. Case of the School of Architecture and Urbanism in the Metropolitan District of Quito (DMQ), from one of the co-authors of this document.

The methodology starts from the analysis of the daily itineraries of 41 students of the Faculty of Architecture of the UCE, through an integrated GPS app called Wikiloc, chosen for its easy installation on cell phones and for being an application with which students are familiar with. Through an interview with Each student, the frequency of each trip and the motives which were divided by activities of university studies, sports, work, health, food, family, supplies and recreation were identify. This information was crossed with the location of the student's residence and the location’s socioeconomic level, taking into account their everyday mobility.

Among the results, it was identified that students who live in the northern and southern urban limits of the DMQ, and have less urban accessibility, are those who spend more time commuting, regardless of their socioeconomic status. Likewise, diversity of activities and the residential location of the students, affects positively the Hipercentro of the DMQ and negatively to the external neighborhoods, These aspects influence in the same sense, in the variety and frequency of their daily activities.

Therefore, we verify that the accessibility and functional diversity of the places of residence of university students are fundamental for the development of activities that promote their development.  This will promote a greater frequency of health and recreational activities; as well as taking care of their eating habits. On the other hand, it emphasizes that sports activities are not related to accessibility to special urban facilities, but to other cultural factors in which it would be necessary have further studies. It was also found that if there is a gender component in the organization of students’ displacements with children, influenced by their role as resp for them and the home.