Your TravTek Driving Experience: Rental Users Study: Data Summary

NHTSA · 1993 · ROSA P / TravTek

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Summary

This report summarizes data from the TravTek Evaluation Task B1 Rental Users Study, conducted between March 1992 and March 1993. The study aimed to evaluate user perceptions and driving experiences with the TravTek in-vehicle navigation and information system. The analysis focuses on primary drivers from a subset of 1,608 rental trips, excluding "VIP" users and those with data conflicts. Participants were divided into three system configurations: Services (369 users), Navigation (921 users), and Navigation Plus (1,278 users). The data is derived from questionnaires assessing demographic background, feature-specific usability, and overall system impressions. The methodology relied on self-reported survey data using Likert-scale ratings (1–6) and frequency counts. Demographic analysis revealed that primary drivers were predominantly married with children, had a median household income of $60,000–$79,999, and averaged 45 years of age. The study evaluated specific system components, including the Guidance Display, Route Map, Zoom features, Voice Guide, and steering wheel controls. Users rated attributes such as ease of learning, ease of use, helpfulness in finding routes, interference with driving, and proper functionality. Results indicated high satisfaction with core navigation features. The Guidance Display was rated highly for ease of learning (mean 5.46/6) and ease of use (5.40/6), with low interference scores (2.42/6). Similarly, steering wheel buttons were rated easy to use (5.47/6) and easy to find (5.26/6). Users preferred modes that combined visual maps with voice guidance; "Map with voice" received a mean liking score of 5.44/6, whereas "Voice only" scored lower (4.05/6). While users agreed that TravTek helped them find their way (mean 4.92/6 for steering buttons), perceptions regarding time savings and congestion avoidance were more moderate, with mean scores of 4.65/6 and 3.28/6, respectively. Traffic-related features, such as updated traffic messages, showed mixed utility, with some users reporting they did not use these features. The findings suggest that TravTek was perceived as an intuitive and non-distracting tool for navigation, particularly when visual and auditory cues were combined. The high ratings for ease of use and low interference scores indicate that the system successfully integrated into the driving experience without compromising attention. However, the moderate scores for congestion avoidance and time savings imply that while the system aided in route finding, its impact on traffic efficiency was less pronounced or consistent. These results provide empirical evidence on user acceptance of early in-vehicle navigation systems, highlighting the importance of multimodal interfaces and ergonomic control placement.

Key finding

Primary drivers rated the TravTek system's ease of learning and use highly, with mean scores between 5.24 and 5.47 across configurations, while reporting low levels of interference with driving.

Methodology

survey

Sample size: 1608

Provenance

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Summary generated by qwen3.6-27b-prismaquant on 2026-06-10; verification: verified.

Topics

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• nav systems

Information type

What kind of knowledge this paper contributes, grouped by family — independent of topic (what it is about) and method (how it was studied).

• Empirical Findings: observational prevalence, self report data
• Methodological Resource: dataset resource