ABSTRACT
This study investigated the performance of rural public bus transport services in Jordan Valley during COVID-19. Jordan Valley consists of three brigades;Southern Shouneh, Deir Alla, and Northern Shouneh. The performance measures included availability, comfort and convenience, waiting time, mobility, productivity, and safety for the external and internal bus routes. The names, number of buses, and fares for bus routes were obtained from Land Transport Regulatory Commission of Jordan (LTRC). The field survey consisted of interviews with passengers and drivers in addition to direct field observations. The average waiting time for both the minibuses and microbuses at off-peak hours was found twice and half the waiting time at peak hours. The minimum and maximum values of the average speed varied between 40 to 100 km/h for the external routes and between 30-90 km/h for the internal routes. As a productivity measure, the average operating ratio for the internal routes was found 2.09 and 1.38 for the external routes. 60% of the microbuses obliged to the stated fare in comparison to minibuses in which all of them obliged to the stated fare. It was found that 40% of the external bus routes were within the range of overall Level of Service (LOS) between C & D, 26.67% within the range of LOS between B & D, 13.33% within the range of LOS between B & C, 13.33% within the range between C & E, and 6.67% within the range between D & E. Also, it was found that 60% of internal bus routes were within the range of LOS between C & D, 20% within the range of LOS between C & E, and 20% within the range of LOS C. The developed regression models between the average perception waiting time as dependent variable and travel time as independent variable were found significant at α-level < 0.05, with r2 = 0.505 at peak periods and r2 = 0.673 at off-peak period.