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An activity-based approach for scheduling multimodal transit services

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Abstract

This paper proposes a new activity-based transit assignment model for investigating the scheduling (or timetabling) problem of transit services in multi-modal transit networks. The proposed model can be used to generate the short-term and long-term timetables of multimodal transit lines for transit operations and service planning purposes. The interaction between transit timetables and passenger activity-travel scheduling behaviors is captured by the proposed model, as the activity and travel choices of transit passengers are considered explicitly in terms of departure time choice, activity/trip chain choices, activity duration choice, transit line and mode choices. A heuristic solution algorithm which combines the Hooke–Jeeves method and an iterative supply–demand equilibrium approach is developed to solve the proposed model. Two numerical examples are presented to illustrate the differences between the activity-based approach and the traditional trip-based method, together with comparison on the effects of optimal timetables with even and uneven headways. It is shown that the passenger travel scheduling pattern derived from the activity-based approach is significantly different from that obtained by the trip-based method, and that a demand-sensitive (with uneven headway) timetable is more efficient than an even-headway timetable.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the guest editors and three anonymous referees for their helpful comments and constructive suggestions on an earlier version of the manuscript. The work described in this paper was jointly supported by grants from the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (PolyU 5215/09E), the Research Committee of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (G-YX1V), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (70971045), the Foundation for the Author of National Excellent Doctoral Dissertation of China (200963), the University Research Committee of the University of Hong Kong (10400582/00002771), and the Program for New Century Excellent Talents in University of China (NCET-10-0385).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Civil and Structural Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China

    Zhi-Chun Li, William H. K. Lam & A. Sumalee

  2. School of Management, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430074, China

    Zhi-Chun Li

  3. Department of Civil Engineering, The University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam Road, Hong Kong, China

    S. C. Wong

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  1. Zhi-Chun Li
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  2. William H. K. Lam
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  3. S. C. Wong
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  4. A. Sumalee
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Correspondence to William H. K. Lam.

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Li, ZC., Lam, W.H.K., Wong, S.C. et al. An activity-based approach for scheduling multimodal transit services. Transportation 37, 751–774 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11116-010-9291-z

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