This paper presents a critical investigation of reasons for using transit by residents of the City of Calgary, Canada. Reasons for using transit are expressed as functions of people's perceptions and attitudes towards transit service quality and attributes. A multinomial logit model combined with latent variable models is developed to capture unobserved latent variables in defining perceptions and attitudes. Using data from a transit customer satisfaction survey conducted in 2007 by Calgary Transit, this approach models the reasons for choosing transit and tests the significance of two individual specific latent variables: perceptions of ‘reliability and convenience’ and ‘ride comfort’. Many behavioural details are revealed that have important policy implications. Most importantly, it is found that the people of Calgary value ‘reliability and convenience’ over ‘ride comfort’. As for policy implications of the findings, it is clear that improving the connectivity of train service, reducing multimodal transfers, and increasing dedicated right‐of‐ways for transit would effectively increase transit ridership in Calgary. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.