Association of Transport Accessibility with the Spread of COVID-19 in Japan: An Analysis of the Period of January to September 2020

Abstract

This study investigates how transport accessibility was associated with the accumulative number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 and its daily new cases, at the prefecture level, in Japan. The analysis was conducted month by month from January to September, 2020. A gravity model was estimated to measure transport accessibility and a nonlinear regression model was estimated how much transport accessibility is associated with the spread of COVID-19. Analysis results suggest that the Japanese government may need to pay sufficient attention to lifting various restrictions of both activity participation and trip making, both within cities and across cities, for preventing further spread of this virus in Japan.

Note: Funding: This research was financially supported by two research funds from Japan Society and Technology Agency (JST). The first project is titled “Impacts of COVID-19 on the transport and logistics sector and countermeasures”, supported by the J-RAPID program within the Strategic International Collaborative Research Program (SICORP). The second project is titled “Overcoming Vulnerability and Restoring Social Justice in Community and Re-designing Cities by Introducing Social Distancing Principle”, supported by the ELSI “Responsible Innovation with Conscience and Agility” of the Research Institute of Science and Technology for Society.

Conflict of Interest: No potential conflicts of interest were disclosed.

Keywords: COVID-19, Public health, Pandemics, Transport accessibility, Infection cases, Japan