A zonal inference model based on observed smart-card transactions for Santiago de Chile
The collection of origin–destination data for a city is an important but often costly task. This way, there is a need to develop more efficient and inexpensive methods of collecting information about citizens’ travel patterns. In this line, this paper presents a generic methodology that allows to infer the origin and destination zones for an […]
About attitudes and perceptions finding the proper way to consider latent variables in discrete choice models
We provide an in-depth theoretical discussion about the differences between attitudes and perceptions, as well as an empirical exercise to analyze its effects. This discussion is of importance, as the large majority of papers considering attitudinal latent variables, just consider those as attributes affecting directly the utility of a certain alternative while systematic taste variations […]
A joint best-worst scaling and stated choice model considering observed and unobserved heterogeneity: an application to residential location choice
Traditional stated choice (SC) experiments are the most widely used method for measuring individual preferences. Notwithstanding, the issue of differentiating between the impacts of the attributes per se vs. the impact of the attribute levels shown in the experiment has been something of a challenge for researchers. Recent studies suggest that Best–Worst scaling (B–W) experiments […]
Dealing with collinearity in travel time valuation
The value of travel time (VOT) is defined as the marginal rate of substitution between travel time and travel cost, and it is typically calculated using standard econometric techniques. However, it is very common for both variables (travel time and travel cost) to present high correlation, artificially increasing the variance of the VOT estimator. We […]
What is behind fare evasion in urban bus systems? An econometric approach
Fare evasion is a problem in many public transport systems around the world and policies to reduce it are generally aimed at improving control and increasing fines. We use an econometric approach to attempt explaining the high levels of evasion in Santiago, Chile, and guide public policy formulation to reduce this problem. In particular, a […]
Accounting for stochastic variables in discrete choice models
PurchaseExport Search ScienceDirect Advanced Elsevier Transportation Research Part B: Methodological Volume 78, August 2015, Pages 222-237 Transportation Research Part B: Methodological Accounting for stochastic variables in discrete choice models Author links open overlay panelFedericoDíazaVíctorCantillobJulianArellanabJuan de DiosOrtúzarc Show more https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trb.2015.04.013Get rights and content Highlights • Explanatory variables in DCM cannot be assumed as deterministic. • We […]
¿Qué más hay detrás de la evasión en el transporte público? Un enfoque econométrico
La evasión es un problema en muchos sistemas de transporte público alrededor del mundo. Las estrategias para reducirla están generalmente enfocadas en aumentar la inspección y las multas. En esta tesis, se analizan otras variables para explicar los altos niveles de evasión en Santiago, con el propósito de orientar las políticas públicas en esta materia. […]
Cost efficiency under negotiated performance-based contracts and benchmarking: Are there gains through competitive tendering in the absence of an incumbent public monopolist?
This paper uses data obtained from numerous sources in Australia to assess the extent to which negotiated performance-based contracts with actionable benchmarking can achieve as good as, or better, improvement in cost efficiency compared to competitive tendering when incumbents are not public operators. Stakeholders who promote the position that the government should choose to test […]
Customer service quality and benchmarking in public transport contracts
As contracting of public transport services increases in sophistication, there is a growing focus on an increasing number of key performance indicators that emphasis service quality. Although contracts won under competitive tendering or by negotiation are assessed on a number of evaluation criteria, cost efficiency still remains the main basis for selecting a preferred operator. […]
Using contracted assets to undertake non‐contracted services as a way to improve cost efficiency under negotiated or tendered bus contracts
Public transit (bus) operators in many jurisdictions throughout the world currently deliver regular public transport services under a negotiated contract, typically between five and ten years, with renegotiation commonly assumed. In the last 20 years, however, there has been a move to competitively tendered service supply or a dialogue as a pre-phase to considering competitive […]
Identifying preferences for public transport investments under a constrained budget
As urban areas face increasing demands for new transport infrastructure to promote a sustainable future with an increasing reality of constrained government budgets, the debate on whether we should focus on rail or bus-based investments continues unabated in many jurisdictions. Associated with the debate is an emotional (or ideological) bias by communities in favour of […]
Identifying resident preferences for bus-based and rail-based investments as a complementary buy in perspective to inform project planning prioritisation
Much of the debate associated with the development of new public transport infrastructure appears to have an emotional bias with communities in favour of one mode, especially rail. This, in turn, carries much sway at the political level as if there is no budget constraint or consideration of value for money and coverage. This paper […]
Bus Rapid Transit and Buses with High Levels of Service: A Global Overview
Traditional public transport planning textbooks and guidelines indicate a hierarchy of transport modes according to capacity and speed (Vuchic, 2007; UN-Habitat, 2013). Buses are usually recommended for low capacity applications; while rail, in the form of Light Rail Transit, Metro and Regional Rail are generally recommended for medium and high capacity applications. Nevertheless, thanks to […]
Greening Demand Chains in urban passenger transport: emission savings from complex trip chains?
It is well known that a significant amount to passenger trip activity involves multiple modes, destinations and trip purposes. For example, with multi-worker households, we observe a car commuter taking a child to a child care centre en route to work and also dropping their partner off at another location such as a railway station. […]
“The War for the Fare”: How Driver Compensation Affects Bus System Performance
Prior to 2007, two systems of bus driver compensation coexisted in Santiago, Chile: one paid drivers per passenger transported, while the other paid a fixed wage. Per-passenger drivers engaged in “The War for the Fare,” altering their driving patterns to compete for passengers. Examining these systems on similar routes in Santiago, we observed two key […]
Better, Quicker, Together: piloting a mobile crowdsourcing approach to real-time sensing of transit service quality and customer satisfaction
Transforming bus transit in Brasilia: from conventional bus lines to a BRT integrated system
BRT and bus priority corridors including BHLS: a global overview
From planning to implementation: the successful case of Belo Horizonte’s bus massive transit network
Mega Events and the Transformation of Rio de Janeiro into a Mass-Transit City
Guidelines for BRT Contracts
A hierarchical public transport mode/route choice model considering user behaviour and Access stops
Obtaining public transport level-of-service measures using in vehicle GPS data and freely available GIS web-based tools
In this chapter, the authors present a procedure to obtain some Level-Of-Service (LOS) measures, such as waiting times, travel times, and their variability, at any spatial and temporal aggregation level for dense bus networks using freely available map and geographic software. The proposed methodology is highly flexible, as it can accommodate either fixed or variable […]
Is sequential estimation a suitable second best for estimation of hybrid choice models?
The simultaneous estimation method has overtaken the sequential approach as the preferred estimation method for hybrid discrete choice models. Notwithstanding, the computational cost of the simultaneous estimation can be prohibitive when models become more involved, and in such cases sequential estimation can still be a potent option. In previous work a theoretical analysis was conducted […]
Exploring the role of social capital influence variables on travel behaviour
This paper explores the potential role of individual trip characteristics and social capital network variables in the choice of transport mode. A sample of around 100 individuals living or working in one suburb of Madrid (i.e. Las Rosas district of Madrid) participated in a smartphone short panel survey, entering travel data for an entire working […]
Traffic safety in surface public transport systems: a synthesis of research
While there is a growing body of literature on transit safety, most studies on this topic tend to focus on a single type of transit system or on a single city. There is a need for a better understanding of safety issues across different transit modes and in different geographies in order to help inform […]
Applying the General Transit Feed Specification (GTFS) to the Global South: Experiences in Mexico City and Beyond
A combination of open data tools and methods, facilitated by data format standardization, has started changing business as usual in the transit industry. The general transit feed specification (GTFS) has become the de facto standard for releasing public transit route and schedule data. This study analyzed this rapidly evolving transit information sector through the Mexico […]
Exploring the relationship between ‘Ex Ante’ support for voting to prioritise government investment and a willingness to pay higher taxes for transport investment
Communities of stakeholders are increasingly demanding a voice on how governments should prioritise the amount spent on investment projects, especially in areas such as transport, education and health where the cry is loud for a greater commitment of funds to improve infrastructure. Using data collected in six Australian capital cities in 2013, we investigate the […]
Exploring Connection Between Climate Change and Traffic Safety: Initial Aggregate Assessment
Climate change and road safety are intrinsically connected. Vehicle kilometers (miles) traveled or VKT (VMT), an indicator of the total amount of motorized roadway travel in a given jurisdiction, is at the same time a strong predictor of transport related greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and traffic fatalities. While both climate change and road safety can […]
Public transport integration in Bogotá and Cali, Colombia – Facing transition from semi-deregulated services to full regulation citywide
Several Latin American cities are replacing their semi-deregulated and dispersed public transport services by integrated public transport systems to overcome quality of service issues and multiple negative externalities. Cities can choose to implement their reform quickly – like Santiago, Chile – or gradually, as has been the case in the Colombian cities of Cali, since […]
A review of technological improvements in bus rapid transit (BRT) and buses with high level of service (BHLS)
Bus rapid transit BRT, and its European counterpart buses with high level of service BHLS, have been adopted by more than 160 cities around the world as a low cost, rapid implementation option for improved transit services. This paper summarizes some past advances of BRT and BHLS and presents some trends in vehicle guidance, propulsion […]
Planning, operation, and control of bus transport systems: A literature review
The efficiency of a transport system depends on several elements, such as available technology, governmental policies, the planning process, and control strategies. Indeed, the interaction between these elements is quite complex, leading to intractable decision making problems. The planning process and real-time control strategies have been widely studied in recent years, and there are several […]
An integrated approach for timetabling and vehicle scheduling problems to analyze the trade-off between level of service and operating costs of transit networks
In transit systems there is a critical trade-off between the level of service and operating costs. At the planning level, for a given network design, this trade-off is captured by the timetabling (TT) and vehicle scheduling (VS) problems. In the TT problem we try to maximize the number of passengers benefited by well timed transfers, […]
Modelling parking choices considering user heterogeneity
We examine car driver’s behaviour when choosing a parking place; the alternatives available are free on-street parking, paid on-street parking and parking in an underground multi-storey car park. A mixed logit model, allowing for correlation between random taste parameters and estimated using stated choice data, is used to infer values of time, both when looking […]
Bus Control Strategy Application: Case Study of Santiago Transit System
Buses have an inherent tendency to bunch due to randomness in passenger demand and congestion. Many sophisticated control strategies have been developed to reduce bus bunching, however, few of them have been implemented in high frequency real services. Building upon a control strategy comprised of a rolling horizon mathematical programming model that yields the optimal […]
Evaluating BRT improvements in Mexico City: How feasible is to improve a consolidated system?
In several cities, bus rapid transit (BRT) systems have begun to experience problems of capacity. Various solutions have been proposed to address these problems, from simple operational modifications to improvements that require modification of the existing infrastructure. Decisions about modification are a challenging undertaking for policy makers; proposals need to be evaluated on the basis […]
The Impact of Bus Rapid Transit on Housing Price and Accessibility Changes in Sydney: A Repeat Sales Approach
New public transport infrastructure is expected to improve accessibility for local residents, and thus contribute to increased land value. The contribution that a bus rapid transit (BRT) system can make to increased land value is less certain than for rail-based systems, with the literature mostly containing bus-based examples from developing countries with extensive BRT networks. […]
Analyzing route choice strategies on transit networks
Understanding and modeling mode and route decisions on a transit system is a key element in urban transportation planning. For doing this is necessary to identify and model the individuals’ behavior and the route choice strategies they follow. Traditional models propose three route choice strategies: Minimum Itineraries (fixed stations and fixed single-lines), Minimum Routes (fixed […]
A behavioural comparison of route choice on metro networks: Time, transfers, crowding, topology and socio-demographics
Understanding travellers’ behaviour is key element in transportation planning. This article presents a route choice model for metro networks that considers different time components as well as variables related to the transferring experience, train crowding, network topology and socio-demographic characteristics. The route choice model is applied to the London Underground and Santiago Metro networks, to […]
Understanding travellers behaviour in public transport networks: preferences and perceptions
Citizens’ Anti-highway Revolt in Post-Pinochet Chile: Catalyzing Innovation in Transport Planning
During the last third of the 20th century, citizens throughout North America and Europe organized protests against urban highway projects, influencing urban transport planning in ways that shape its evolution to this day. With the globalization of car-centred urban planning models, some similar movements have emerged in developing countries. What, if anything, can they tell […]
Citizen participation for sustainable transport: the case of “Living City” in Santiago, Chile (1997–2012)
Twentieth century citizen “revolts” against urban highway projects have influenced thinking about public transport (Toronto, Vancouver, New York), governance (Portland), and cycling (The Netherlands) to this day. Less is known, however, about how these emerge in developing countries, and what they can tell us about citizens’ role in innovation to achieve more sustainable transport systems. […]
Confiabilidade e Variabilidade do Tempo de Viagem em Sistemas Bus Rapid Transit
Incentive schemes for bus drivers: The case of the public transit system in Santiago, Chile
Although many authors have studied regulatory schemes for bus operators of public transport provision, little attention has been given to incentive schemes for bus drivers in terms of economic incentives and labour conditions. Therefore, there is a need to analyse incentive schemes for bus drivers since the level of service of the bus system is […]
Linking discrete choice to continuous demand in a spatial computable general equilibrium model
Discrete choice (DC) models are often used to describe consumer behaviour at a disaggregate level. At this level, a choice decision is defined in terms of a set of alternatives representing different ‘varieties’ of a particular product differentiated mainly by their quality attributes rather than just prices. Individuals making these choice decisions are also differentiated […]
Tracing a path to knowledge? Indicative user impacts of introducing a public transport map in Dhaka, Bangladesh
The smartphone exemplifies the rhetorical smart city movement. This paper examines one potential use of smartphone technology—mapping public transportation services in a megacity of the Global South. We examine the potential user impacts of introducing a smartphone-generated and analogue-delivered schematic bus map in Dhaka, Bangladesh. After distributing the map, we used a web-based survey to […]
Reflections on citizen-technical dialogue as part of cycling-inclusive planning in Santiago, Chile
Cycling-inclusive urban planning is attracting worldwide attention as cycling has demonstrated its potential for contributing to resolving not only mobility but also diverse issues of social concern (health and physical activity, urban congestion and pollution), amidst the challenges of global warming and the need to define more equitable ways of organizing urban systems, to mitigate […]
Lessons from 40 years of planning for cycle-inclusion: Reflections from Santiago, Chile
Valuing externalities using willingness to pay methods
Efficient contracting and incentive agreements between regulators and bus operators: The influence of risk preferences of contracting agents on contract choice
Abstract Contracts that govern transactions between regulators and operators are an important feature of service delivery in public transport. This paper reviews the literature on efficient contracting in general and its application to public transport contracts and found little empirical evidence on the influence of risk preferences of contracting agents on contract choice, a fundamental premise of classical […]
