Latent Demand and Attribute Insensitivity in Ride-Hailing Preferences: A Multi-City Stated Choice Study in Algeria

Abstract

Ride-hailing is becoming part of urban travel in North Africa, but evidence about demand and governance preferences remains limited. This study examines a quota-controlled survey of 1,800 adults in Algiers, Constantine, and Batna, across three cities with distinct urban transport contexts. Participants reported recent ride-hailing use, answered twelve attitude items, and completed eight choice tasks comparing two ride-hailing profiles with their usual transport mode. The profiles varied in fare, discount, waiting time, reliability, safety provision, and price information. We use "latent demand" only as an operational hypothetical-choice margin: the respondent's share of tasks choosing ride-hailing minus the indicator of ride-hailing use during the previous 30 days. Current use was 30.0%, whereas ride-hailing was selected in 64.7% of tasks, giving a sample-descriptive margin of 34.7 percentage points (95% CI [32.4, 37.1]). Current users and non-users recorded similar hypothetical-choice shares. The twelve profile contrasts were not jointly significant against an opt-out-constant-only model (clustered Wald chi-square (12) = 17.00, p = 0.150), although price-information formats differed jointly (p = 0.003). Choice shares also varied across cities (clustered Wald chi-square (2) = 72.72, p < 0.001). The findings support locally tested mobility governance and auditable sustainability measures, not forecasts of market uptake.