Transportation Investment Research Articles

Application of various machine learning algorithms in view of predicting the CO2 emissions in the transportation sector

This study applies three different artificial intelligence algorithms (Multi-layer Perceptron (MLP), Extreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost), and Support Vector Machine (SVM)) to estimate CO2 emissions in Türkiye’s transportation sector. The input parameters considered are Energy consumption (ENERGY), Vehicle Kilometers (VK), POPulation (POP), Year (Y), and Gross Domestic Product Per Capita (GDP). Strong correlations are observed, with ENERGY having the highest correlation followed by VK, POP, Y, and GDP. Four scenarios are designed based on the correlation effect: scenario 1 (ENERGY/VK/POP/Y/GDP), scenario 2 (ENERGY/VK/POP/Y), scenario 3 (ENERGY/VK/POP), and scenario 4 (ENERGY/VK). Experiments compare their effects on CO2 emissions using statistical indicators (R2, RMSE, MSE, and MAE). Across all scenarios and algorithms, R2 values range from 0.8969 to 0.9886, and RMSE values range from 0.0333 to 0.1007. The XGBoost algorithm performs best in scenario 4. Artificial intelligence algorithms prove successful in estimating CO2 emissions. This study has significant implications for policymakers and stakeholders. It highlights the need to review energy investments in transportation and implement regulations, restrictions, legislation, and obligations to reduce emissions. Artificial intelligence algorithms offer the potential for developing effective strategies. Policymakers can use these insights to prioritize sustainable energy investments. In conclusion, this study provides insights into the relationship between input parameters and CO2 emissions in the transportation sector. It emphasizes the importance of proactive measures and policies to address the sector’s environmental impact. It also contributes to the understanding of AI-assisted CO2 emissions forecasting in the transport sector, potentially informing future policy decisions aimed at emission reduction and sustainable transport development.

From Dazzle to Diesel

The rise of Turkish television drama series—or dizi as they are known in Turkey—is one of the most notable media phenomena of the past decade in francophone West Africa, particularly Guinea. This is taking place at a time when Turkey has significantly ramped up its economic, political, and cultural investments in Africa, with countries such as Guinea, rich in natural resources and with geostrategic sea access, rapidly emerging as new targets for Turkey's outsized ambitions. This article asks what we can learn about the global circulation of Turkish modernity—a unique blend of tantalizing consumerism and piety conceptualized as “neo-Ottoman cool”—in francophone West Africa by analyzing the hugely popular dizi alongside public debates on Turkey's investments in energy, transportation, energy, culture, or construction. Drawing on Joseph Tonda's notion of éblouissement (dazzlement), it argues that Guineans, like other West Africans, encounter the dazzling images of Istanbul's rich and famous that permeate dizi in stark contrast with Turkish investments in floating power plants and public transport or the Turkish-built Abdul Hamid II Mosque in Bambeto, a popular quarter of Conakry. The article proposes the phrase dazzle-to-diesel to account for the constant oscillation between blinding power and toxic fumes that accompanies encounters with neo-Ottoman cool in West Africa.

Transit-Oriented Development: Learnings from Global Examples

Abstract Transit-oriented development (TOD) is a method employed in area-based developments to address civic mobility, automation, inequality, community, equality, and climate change in metropolises. This research paper utilizes a comparative analysis of various published papers to create a cohesive analytical study. The main goal is to identify critical parameters that contribute to the success of TOD. It examines highly successful global examples of TOD, including Hong Kong, Singapore, London, Shenzhen, México, and Washington D.C., to understand how the aforementioned parameters impact TOD development and its achievements. Indian cities are making substantial investments in public transportation and transitioning into transit hubs. The success of this progress depends on implementing TOD regulations, such as zoning rules for mixed-land use, density control, limited parking, PPP finance, and fostering collaboration between public and private agencies near transit stations. In conclusion, while planning frameworks have been widely adopted and implemented by various countries, financial frameworks play a more pivotal role in influencing success, making TOD more practically viable worldwide.

Determinants of public investment for port authorities using port-level data: An analysis of the Spanish port system

This study analyses the economic and political determinants of Spanish port authorities' public investment from 2000 to 2016 using port-level data. We distinguish two types of investment: (i) infrastructure and capacity; (ii) logistics and intermodal transport. We estimate the empirical specification considering dynamic effects and endogeneity. Unlike previous empirical studies in which aggregate port investment was considered, our results show that both economic criteria and political factors matter in the Spanish port investment allocation. We also find that the relevance of the political factors differs by the type of port investment. In this sense, we show that the coincidence between the incumbent political party in the central and local governments influences the port investment related to infrastructure and capacity, whereas the coincidence between the incumbent political party in the central and regional governments affects logistics and intermodal transport investment.

Study on the Transportation Investment Effect of the "Belt and Road" Initiative on China and ASEAN Countries

Study on the Transportation Investment Effect of the "Belt and Road" Initiative on China and ASEAN Countries

Exploring Nexus between Transportation System and Economic Development in Nigeria: A Case of Railway Passenger Travel

Studies frequently explored the relationship between economic performance and transport investments. However, how the performance of the economy relates to the usage of transport in Africa and Nigeria in particular is poorly explored prompting investigation on the nexus between railway passenger travel and economic development in Nigeria. The study employed the Vector Auto-Regressive (VAR) Model to analyse the 60-year annual time series data of railway passenger movement, annual GDP, and inflation. Results indicate about 72.5% of the variables entered in the model accounted for 72.5% of changes observed in railway passenger traffic with Lag 1 of passenger travel exerting the most substantial influence on the output. The result further shows Inflation and GDP (x= 0.485223; P= 0.7846.) as well as their lags are redundant in forecasting the 60-year data. The study concludes that economic performance does not influence travel by railways among passengers using railways in Nigeria. Keywords: Economic performance, Railway, Passenger travel, Transportation system

Transport macro accessibility at the Metropolitan Region of São Paulo (MRSP)

This study aims to analyze the macro accessibility of the Metropolitan Region of São Paulo (MRSP) in 2017. Based on data from the Metro Origin and Destination Survey (2017), a descriptive analysis was carried out and a Generalized Linear Model (GLM) was developed. The sample received treatment for the selection of trips departing from the residence and with territorial disaggregation levels that allow verifying the effect of centrality in the regional analysis of RMSP. The results show that the road transport infrastructure has vast territorial coverage, while rail transport infrastructure is concentrated in the center of RMSP. It was found that the closer to the center, the greater the use of individual transport and, the further away, the greater the use of public transport. Statistical modeling showed that Euclidean distance (4.3 min/km), the number of modes used in travel (8.1 min/mode), and the first mode chosen are statistically significant and relevant predictors (with bus having the longest average duration, followed by rail transport). Individual modes obtained the greatest advantage in macro accessibility since less time is used for vehicle access and less time for displacement after transport use (micro accessibility). Also, they do not depend on vehicle transfers and are faster during travel. It is concluded that investment in rail transport will allow better environmental conditions for captive users of public transport, with a decrease in micro accessibility time and a decrease in travel duration, with potential competition with individual modes.

Simulation–optimisation approach for sustainable planning of intermodal logistics in the Brazilian grain export industry

Planning nationwide sustainable logistics for grain exports at a tactical level assumes flexibility in handling uncertainties. Despite the dynamic operations, the solution’s approach focuses mainly on optimisation, leaving out the queuing requirements. This paper presents a simulation–optimisation approach for planning the Brazilian intermodal grain export chain by integrating trucks, railways, and port terminal operations. We evaluate a base scenario, aiming to minimise CO2 emissions in rail transport, meeting demand requirements, and three alternative planning scenarios concerning demand retraction, trend, and expansion. The sustainable grain transportation plan of the base scenario shows a 66.8 kilo tons CO2/year emission reduction while increasing the exports by 2.51% (approximately 146 kilo tons grains/year) and a contribution to profit of $43.82 million in the short term. Scenario analyses open discussions about sustainable investments in intermodal transport for the medium and long term. The proposed approach is suitable for other commodity chains, representing a step towards consistently applying environmentally oriented supply chain planning.

Olympic Public Transportation Investments, Legacy, and City Prosperity: An Empirical Look at the 2000-2016 Summer Games

The complexity of hosting the Olympic Games has grown throughout its history. The financial risks to cities vying for the hosting rights are often viewed as excessive and consequently, fewer bids are being submitted in modern times. Critics suggest that public funds would be better spent supporting other social programs. However, history has demonstrated that host cities can use the Games to expand and modernize public transport systems to efficiently move people, increase accessibility, reduce personal travel and garner environmental benefits like improved air quality and less noise pollution. The authors examined the five Summer Olympic Games host cities between 2000-2016 using the City Prosperity Index (CPI) to measure city performance across six indexes to determine the accrued public transit benefits of hosting the Games. The authors hope this paper can provide a clear path forward for future Olympic bidders and city officials. Keywords: Olympic Games, City Prosperity Index, public transportation, investments

Role of Demographic Factors in Shaping Sustainable Lifestyles: An Empirical Study in Vietnam

In recent years, sustainable lifestyles (SLS) has emerged as a topic that addresses the trend of sustainable development globally. However, most developing and emerging economies have not put adequate effort to promote SLS. Vietnam is not an exception. There is not much evidence of how Vietnamese people are responding to the urgent call of actions towards sustainable development. In such a context, this paper explores how demographic factors shape the SLS in Vietnam. An online survey was implemented to gather primary data from Vietnamese people in four months. Finally, we received 385 valid responses. ANOVA tests were employed to check the proposed hypotheses about the differences in SLS regarding age, gender, and income. Research results revealed that age, gender and income are not associated with the SLS of Vietnamese people. Our findings imply that the Vietnamese government should play a proactive role in promoting SLS. Some recommendations were proposed, including investment in public transportation, sustainable product design, zero-waste policies, and the like.

Transit-induced socioeconomic ascent and new metro stations in Helsinki Metropolitan Area: Distinct effects on renters, homeowners, and pre-existing housing dwellers

In recent years, transit-oriented developments have been studied from different angles in different countries. Question has been raised whether public investments in transportation trigger the areas nearby to gentrify or even cause the affordability paradox for the low-income households if they cannot afford to live in the accessibility improved areas. This article contributes to the literature of transit-induced neighbourhood change by estimating the short-term causal effect of accessibility improvements on neighbourhoods' household income, share of highly educated individuals, and share of low-income households, separating between renters and residents in the existing and new housing stock. We are using a quasi-experimental study design with propensity score matching and difference-in-differences regression setup to analyse the socioeconomic changes in the areas close to the newly built metro stations. Overall, we identify a positive effect on the share of residents with higher educations, but don't see effects on median household income or share of low-income households. However, on closer examination, we find short-term transit-induced changes for residents in old housing stock, and to some extent for homeowners, but for the renters we don't find significant results. The findings of this article show that short-term transit-induced neighbourhood change occurs in areas where accessibility has improved.

How accessibility to schools is not (just) a transport problem: the case of public school choice in the city of Malmö, Sweden

There is currently a lack of studies exploring how transport investments and school admission policies in a city can affect the distribution of accessibility to schools. The aim of this study is to investigate if, for whom, and the ways in which, accessibility to schools can change following (1) a change to the city’s public school admission policy and (2) investments in public transport infrastructure and adjustments to the public transport system. We draw on the case of Malmö, Sweden to examine the potential effects of these changes. This study is focused specifically on those in grades 7–9 (aged approximately 13–15), a group whose independent mobility is starting to take form. A geospatial analysis was carried out in order to compare the change in demographic makeup between school catchment areas (real and hypothetical) before and after the changes were made. The geospatial analysis utilises a cumulative opportunity accessibility model that takes into account typical public transport travel times both before and after these new measures were implemented. Findings indicate that the (hypothetical) school catchment areas have been redistributed to a considerable extent following both interventions, but particularly following the change to the public school admission policy. These redistributions have in turn resulted in changes in the socio-economic characteristics of the hypothetical school catchment areas. While the redistribution of school catchment areas could potentially change the socio-economic composition of schools in Malmö, the effects are not equally distributed throughout the city. While the addition of the new train line was the main focus of this study, it was found that other changes in the public transport system between 2018 and 2019 also played a role in determining which schools students could and could not access. The findings from this study highlight the importance of carefully considering the interaction of different effects when assessing policy alternatives.

Potential impacts of transportation infrastructure improvements to maize and cassava supply chains in Zambia

Agricultural supply chains play a crucial role in supporting food security in Africa. However, high-resolution supply chain information is often not available, which hinders our ability to determine which interventions in food supply chains would most enhance food security. In this study, we develop a high-resolution supply chain model for essential staple crops in Zambia, aiming to estimate how improvements in transportation infrastructure would impact food security. Specifically, we simulate district-level monthly consumption, trade flows, and storage for maize and cassava in Zambia. We then conduct a counterfactual case study with low transportation costs, discovering that reducing transaction costs leads to higher aggregate net agricultural revenue and aggregate net expenditure. These results indicate that transportation investments are more beneficial to suppliers than to consumers, with implications for household food security in smallholder agriculture. Our study highlights the potential for infrastructure investments to improve food security.

What inhibits the progress of early-career women in Karachi? Studying the effects of socio-spatial mobility barriers on women's employment.

There is a widespread acceptance and shift towards sustainable, inclusive and smart mobility solutions around the world. However, in Karachi, poorly coordinated urban planning, lack of effective governance structure and investment in transport, has allowed the growth of an almost unregulated and ungovernable informal transport sector. Women are more severely affected by the poor service since men not only have more space allocated to them on public transport but also have the freedom to use alternative and cheaper private vehicles such as motorbikes and cycles. Poor representation of women in the transport sector further aggravates the situation. The paper aims to highlight the gender-disaggregated effects of poor transport design, provision and lack of personal agency on mobility, for emphasising the social and cultural attitudes faced by female employees. It argues that not integrating the gender-based disadvantages faced by women into planning, reinforces their disadvantaged position and force them to take complex trips. Scenario-based questions were designed for focus group discussion which covered not only the everyday mobility challenges but also their reactions to the potential solutions. For a gender-based comparative analysis, two separate focus group discussions were organised. Adopting a sector-based mapping approach of the issues discussed in the groups helped understand the complexity of female user experience at various levels, starting from planning or discussing the trips with families, to making modal choices. It also helped to tease out the impact of these issues on their employment opportunities as early-career women. The model proposed in this paper can help illustrate where changes can be made in the system considering the social aspects of transport.

Towards analyzing the robustness of the Integrated Global Transportation Network Abstraction (IGTNA)

The well-functioning of our transportation systems is essential for ensuring the mobility of people and goods. According to the Sustainable Developmental Goals (SDG) adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 2015, it is of utmost importance to build and maintain a resilient infrastructure. In terms of transportation systems, a resilient infrastructure guarantees seamless connections and robustness against failures and targeted attacks. Existing studies on small-scale road, subway, or air transportation networks have revealed interesting patterns and phenomena for different parts of the world. These studies, however, are usually either spatially or modal-wise constrained. Most notably this holds for the worldwide airport network, which has frequently been analyzed in the literature. Transportation interactions on the ground are usually considered through aggregation of nodes into either cities or multiple airport regions. This conceptual simplification leaves room for the analysis of an Integrated Global Transportation Network Abstraction (IGTNA), covering aviation and ground transportation on our planet. We believe that it is crucial for planners and analysts to include all infrastructure, assets, networks, modes, and users as a single system. IGTNA enables to model all aspects of interconnectivity at a high-level of details, encoding points of interests as nodes and potential transitions between points of interests as links. Our aggregated network representation of the global transportation system consists of 5.3 million nodes and more than 8.6 million links. We propose scalable data extraction and network dismantling techniques. This study is, to the best of our knowledge, the first to report on the robustness of the IGTNA. We believe that our study enables decision-makers to achieve effective decision-making on future transportation investment through a holistic understanding of the impacts from negative shocks of disruptive events.

Improving transportation project evaluation by recognizing the role of spatial scale and context in measuring non-user economic benefits

The usefulness of transportation project evaluation depends on the completeness of its benefit measures. Since transportation networks are intrinsically spatial, transportation improvement projects have spatial access and location characteristics that can lead to a variety of non-user economic benefits. Recent research has enabled us to better understand how spatial context and spatial heterogeneity play further roles in generating efficiency gains for non-users, in the form of productivity, income, and cost savings for both private and public sectors of the economy. This paper draws upon that body of research to expand our understanding of the means by which transportation projects can generate economic efficiency gains, and approaches needed to measure them. It covers topics beyond those captured by current definitions of “wider economic benefits,” including additional sources of scale economies associated with freight distribution and connectivity, and further public and private sector economic gains enabled by environmental and social inclusion improvement. It points to ways that non-user economic benefits can be more comprehensively defined and better measured by recognizing their spatial scale, context, and threshold effects. It also identifies ways that current benefit measurement methods introduce unintended bias into transportation investment decision-making through omission and mismeasurement. The result is a case for a refresh of thinking about how we classify and recognize non-user economic benefits in transportation evaluation, and how we apply transportation planning and economic models to support their measurement.

Innovative ICT Applications to Increase Social Acceptance of Transport Investments

Consideration of the environmental impact of transport investments is typically one of the critical aspects in the preparation phase of decisions, strongly influenced by the degree and quality of public participation. Environmental regulation often uses instruments that favour direct government intervention, while other methods based on agreements has minor attention. An overview of the environmental economics of transaction costs and exploring of the processes leading to agreements will be the basis of our work. Then, we summarise existing Information and Communication Technology (ICT) services are already available to understand and address the environmental problems. These services are usually limited to certain functions, however additional ICT solutions would increase the level of cooperation between investors and stakeholders. The aim of this research is to propose an ICT platform for facilitating agreements that improve environmental quality. We present the structure of the ICT platform, its essential features and possible implementations. Our platform may contribute to the preparation phase of several types of projects and provide an innovative tool for optimal level of pollution. Through practical examples the potential applications of the proposed ICT system in transport and urban development schemes will be shown and the estimation of achievable benefits will be given.
 Keywords: environmental sustainability, social acceptance, information and communication technologies, transaction costs, transport investments.

Connectivity-based spatial patterns and factors influencing international container multimodal hubs in China under the Belt and Road initiative

The location and layout of container multimodal hubs have received much research attention under the Belt and Road Initiative. To explore the spatial distribution pattern of international container multimodal hubs (ICMHs) and its influencing factors in China, this paper measures the domestic connectivity, international land connectivity, international rail-sea multimodal connectivity and comprehensive connectivity of ICMHs. Spatial analysis methods are used to explore the spatial patterns of ICMH connectivity, and then spatial regression models are applied to detect those key factors that influence its distribution. Results reveal that ICMH connectivity has significant spatial differences and obvious distribution trends across China and that such connectivity gradually decreases from east to west. The significant spatial agglomeration characteristic of connectivity is also highlighted. Specifically, a high connectivity is concentrated in the east and close to exit ports (land exit-ports and seaports), whereas a low connectivity is distributed in the expansive western areas. Results of the spatial regression also show that each factor has significant spatial heterogeneity with respect to connectivity distribution, especially freight turnover volume and investment in transportation. This study provides support for the layout of logistics hubs in multimodal networks and enriches the application of the connectivity method.

MODELLING THE ECONOMIC INFLUENCE OF TRANSPORT SYSTEM ON TOURISM PERFORMANCE. THE EXPERIENCE FROM LAGOS STATE, NIGERIA

Globally, travel and tourism opportunities are highly sought-after by most nations, but very few developing nations, including Nigeria, play good supporting roles to benefit from the profitable and lucrative industry. The reasons for this are not unconnected to the poor investment in tourism infrastructure, especially transport, to support tourism activities and sustain tourism performance. It is against this background that this study modeled the economic influence of the transport system on tourism performance using Nigeria’s Lagos State experience. This study is anchored on an ex-post facto research design and relies on quantitative data from the relevant ministries of the Lagos State Government. Both descriptive (charts and graphs) and inferential (multiple linear regression analysis) statistics were methods of data analysis. Major findings revealed that only the annual revenue from transport system services out of the nine (9) evaluated performance indicators showed internal consistency and a positively increasing growth pattern. Furthermore, research found that the level of transport investment has a statistically significant relationship with the performance of the tourism industry (. Meanwhile, findings also revealed that there is a statistically significant relationship between the transport system’s revenue and tourism performance (. Given these, this study affirmed that the tourism performance greatly depends on the transport system’sinvestment and revenue and concluded that the fluctuating and poor tourism performance in Lagos State, Nigeria, is a function of the transport system's economic influence. Thus, this study recommends, among others, consistent investment and improvement in the transport system, most especially the infrastructure that will support tourism activities and increase tourism revenue.

MaaS for the masses: Potential transit accessibility gains and required policies under Mobility-as-a-Service

Transit accessibility, the conditions and distance under which people have access to transit services, is one of the key indicators to assess the performance of cities' transit systems. The more people can access the transit system, the better its performance in terms of social equity (e.g., more equal access to jobs, education, and other opportunities). To inform policymakers and support decision-making, it is crucial to measure potential transit accessibility changes of transport investments. Due to the paucity of available data, however, calculating and monitoring transit accessibility is a difficult task. Anchored in SDG 11 for more ‘Sustainable Cities and Communities’, the UN has thus proposed a simplified, globally applicable indicator for the performance of cities’ transit systems (SDG 11.2.1) that measures the share of the population living in a walking distance of 500 m to the transit system. Building on this definition and leveraging open data sources, we analyze potential transit accessibility gains under Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) in Metro Manila, Philippines. We show that the integration of paratransit (i.e., jeepneys) into the transit network could almost triple access to transit from 23.9 % to 65.0 %. The integration of micro-mobility (i.e., e-scooter and bicycles) as a feeder mode could further increase this share significantly (to 97.9 % and 99.9 %, respectively). We outline and discuss evidence-based policy recommendations to exploit this potential and foster a sustainable development under MaaS. Finally, we conclude with a research agenda for micro-mobility and MaaS in developing countries, a topic which has been widely overlooked in the scientific literature so far.