The design of bus route systems — An interactive location-allocation approach

Abstract

An interactive modelling approach is developed to solve the practical problem of bus route network design. Possible bus routes are identified with facilities which can be “located”. Zones or pairs of zones in the urban area are identified with customers who will be “allocated” to the established facilities. It is shown that the classical Set Covering Problem is useful under the assumption of fixed demand; the Simple Plant Location Problem is effective under the assumption of demand which is sensitive to the level of bus service provided.