A clustering method for measuring accessibility and equity in public transportation service: Case study of Melbourne

Abstract

This paper proposes a Modified Cumulative Accessibility (MCA) measure incorporating actual travel demand information (Origin-Destination trip patterns) to improve the accuracy of the measure as a reliable proxy for equity evaluation and amelioration in accessing Public Transportation (PT) services. The travel demand information is reflected into the MCA measure by evaluating and clustering PT and Private Vehicle Transportation (PVT) trip diaries. Both vertical and horizontal equities are measured for the network's Transportation Analysis Zones (TAZs). To redress the inequities, a priority list of operational recommendations for each TAZ is identified. The proposed method is tested with the Greater Melbourne area datasets and the TAZs with the highest inequity along with prescribed operational recommendations are identified. In terms of equitable distribution of public transportation service, a major observation from the case study model was that the outer suburban areas located in the eastern side of the the Melbourne metropolitan area are relatively underserved as compared to the inner and western suburbs.