Passenger Boarding Research Articles

Adjusting Dwell Time for Paratransit Services

Paratransit (door-to-door public transit services for people with disabilities) is a key element of the public transit system. This type of service can be very costly to operate, yet it is essential for social inclusion. The aim of this study was to develop a quantitative approach to estimate paratransit dwell times and improve trip scheduling. Dwell time is defined as the time required for a vehicle to stop to board or alight passengers. Data collected by the paratransit department of the Société de transport de Montréal (STM), the Montreal, Canada, public transit agency, between September 2014 and May 2018 was used to estimate a dwell time model. Over 5 million data points were analyzed using a multiple linear regression model. The model takes into consideration the type of vehicle used, passenger characteristics (ambulatory or wheelchair passenger, support person), the activity performed at the stop (boarding or alighting), the stop location, the time, day and month the trip took place, and the type of place (residential or non-residential) served. The results reveal all these variables have a significant impact on dwell times. Using these results, a method was developed to improve estimated dwell times in STM’s paratransit scheduling system. The new method was implemented on August 1, 2018. The difference between planned and actual travel times was measured, before and after the implementation of the new method. The results show the on-time performance of the service was improved which helped optimize routes and reduce associated operational costs.

Resilience of passenger boarding strategies to priority fares offered by airlines

Increased efficiency of airplane boarding via the jetway is achieved by sequencing passengers at the airport terminal. Various strategies have been developed and implemented at airports. However, even the best strategy can be distorted by the airlines priority fare. Priority passengers board in a random order which destroy the desired boarding sequence. This causes the aircraft aisle to be blocked in different locations. The article analyses the sensitivity of most common boarding strategies to the number of priority passengers. The article gives an example for Airbus A320 with single aisle cabin, configured in 30 rows of 6 seats each. To investigate this issue an original simulation model was developed, which allows to estimate the impact of the number of passengers with priority on the implementation of selected boarding strategies. The results obtained are astonishing. Such distortions have a negative impact on some strategies, while for some strategies better results are obtained. This discrete event based simulation model allows the process manager to choose the appropriate strategy or to abandon the jetway and use the airport stairs to avoid or reduce delaying the aircraft.

A framework to estimate dwell time of BRT systems using fuzzy regression

This paper presents adjustments and validation of a model for the process of passenger boarding and alighting of BRT (Bus Rapid Transport) and express bus systems. Such models are of fundamental importance for the implementation of strategies to con

VESSEL LIFE JACKET COMPATIBILITY MOBILE APPS FOR SAFETY ASSESSMENT

Life jacket is one of the safety appliances that can be found on the ship that provide buoyancy and prevention against drowning. Before the ship can sail, every element of safety of the vessel should be confirmed. Despite the establishment of standards for life jacket, both local and international, there have been cases of drowning associated with the usage of life jackets by the passengers of passenger boat/vessels for open-deck situation. Moreover, deficiency of information on safety instruction is reason the passengers are lack of personal safety information during on board. Thus, the evaluation on safety standard of life jackets and passenger vessel are vital for assessing the provision of the life jacket on board passenger vessel with respect to compatibility between life jacket and passenger vessel. In this paper, A Vessel Life Jacket Compatibility Mobile Apps (VELIT) was developed using software development methodology called Rational Unified Process (RUP) to automate the safety assessment process based on model called LCI (Life Jacket Compatibility Index). VELIT apps synchronized the safety assessment aspect and which allow user to compute the element in the model and produce the result of the safety assessment in real time. The VELIT apps are expected to be used in maritime area especially for ship safety assessment process.

Quantifying Factors Influencing Urban Bus Passenger Boarding and Alighting Dynamics in an Emerging Economy

AbstractA majority of the past studies on bus dwell time have been carried out in the context of developed countries, and the dwell time prediction models established in literature adopted the fixe...

Joint optimization of scheduling and capacity for mixed traffic with autonomous and human-driven buses: A dynamic programming approach

It is a common practice for transit lines with fluctuating passenger demands to use demand-driven bus scheduling to reduce passenger waiting time and avoid bus overcrowding. However, current literature on the demand-driven bus scheduling generally assumes fixed bus capacity and exclusively optimizes bus dispatch headways. With the advent of connected and autonomous vehicle technology and the introduction of autonomous minibus/shuttle, the joint design of bus capacity and dispatch headway holds promises to further improving the system efficiency while reducing operating and passenger costs. This paper formulates this problem as an integer nonlinear programming model for transit systems operating with mixed human-driven and autonomous buses. In such mixed operating environment, the model simultaneously considers: (1) dynamic capacity design of autonomous bus, i.e., autonomous buses with varying capacity can be obtained by assembling and/or dissembling multiple autonomous minibuses; (2) trajectory control of autonomous bus, i.e., autonomous bus can dynamically adjust its running time as a function of its forward and backward headways; and (3) stop-level passenger boarding and alighting behavior. The objective of the model is designed to balance the trade-off between the operating costs of dispatching different types of bus and the costs of increased passenger waiting time due to inadequate bus dispatching. The model is solved using a dynamic programming approach. We show that the proposed model is effective in reducing passenger waiting time and total operating cost. Sensitivity analysis is further conducted to explore the impact of miscellaneous factors on optimal dispatching decisions, such as penetration rate of autonomous bus, bus running time variation, and passenger demand level.

Effect of Passenger Encumbrance and Mobility Aid Use on Dwell Time Variability in Low-floor Transit Vehicles.

Public transit serves users with a broad range of physical capabilities and design needs. However information about the operational effects of diverse users interacting with the transit system is scarce. This paper examined the occurrence and effects of boarding and alighting passengers with mobility aids (wheelchairs, scooters, walkers and canes), or with large items (carts, strollers, bicycles, or carrying an infant) on bus stop dwell time in a fixed-route bus service. On-board video data from low-floor public transit buses serving Ann Arbor, Michigan were used from 199 bus stops with at least one passenger boarding or alighting with a mobility aid or encumbered with a large item, and an additional 1642 bus stops without any mobility aids or encumbrances. A sequence of linear regression models examined the relationship between dwell time and the addition of variables representing passengers with mobility aids and encumbrances, and use of the on-vehicle access ramp, beyond explanatory variables typically used in dwell time analysis. Accounting for passengers boarding/alighting with mobility aids and encumbrances (p < 0.001) and use of the access ramp (p < 0.001) increased the variance explanation of a dwell time model based on boarding passengers by fare payment, alighting passengers by door use, and passenger load from 46% to 56%. Results indicate distinct patterns in the durations for boarding and alighting by passengers with vs. without mobility aids and encumbrances, and when a ramp is used by wheeled mobility users vs. ambulatory passengers with walking aids. The findings suggest that accounting for the presence of passengers with mobility aids or encumbrances and ramp use in dwell time analyses could help transit operators make their service operationally more efficient and inclusive for all passengers and encourage more use of fixed-route transit among individuals with disabilities.

A study on passengers’ alighting and boarding process at metro platform by computer simulation

Abstract Passengers’ alighting and boarding process in metro stations has attracted increasing research attention since it has significant influence on the platform passenger distribution as well as the train dwell time. In this study, a field survey was firstly performed in a densely populated metro station at downtown area in Hong Kong to observe passengers’ alighting and boarding characteristics and collect sample data. One commonly existing phenomenon is found that boarding passengers start to get aboard even when there are alighting passengers still inside the metro carriage. This is defined as passengers’ non-compliance behaviors in this paper. In addition, time indicators are defined to measure the alighting and boarding efficiency. Then a microscopic pedestrian simulation model based on the Social Force Model is proposed to simulate the passengers’ alighting and boarding patterns at metro platform. The verification result shows the good applicability of the proposed model to simulate the actual situation. Finally, several simulation tests are conducted to explore the impacts that passengers’ non-compliance behaviors have on the alighting and boarding efficiency in different passenger volume conditions. The simulation result shows that higher level of passengers’ non-compliance behaviors leads to longer passenger’s alighting duration and boarding duration, but the influence on the overall transaction time is related to different passenger volume conditions. Thus, metro station facility could apply different alighting and boarding rules in different passenger volume conditions to increase alighting and boarding efficiency.

Metro Scheduling to Minimize Travel Time and Operating Cost Considering Spatial and Temporal Constraints on Passenger Boarding

Passengers on metro platforms can board a train only when the train has surplus capacity and the dwell time is sufficient, while the latter condition is omitted in previous studies. Taking into account the impacts of train capacity and dwell time on passengers boarding, this study develops a model on optimizing metro timetable to reduce passenger travel time and metro operating cost, through regulating trains' inter-station run-time, dwell time and headway. The NSGA-II algorithm is employed to obtain the near-optimal Pareto Frontier of the proposed model. To address insufficient dwell time scheduled in the timetable, three operating strategies are proposed and compared: a. sticking to nominal timetable; b. extending dwell time only; c. extending dwell time and recovering delay as soon as possible by compressing train inter-station run-time. Case studies on real-life metro line prove that some passengers cannot board the train during peak hours due to insufficient dwell time. In this context, strategy a brings low-quality service because passengers are stranded at platform even though the train has surplus capacity. In contrast, more passengers can board the train with strategies b and c because dwell time is extended for passengers' boarding when train has surplus capacity. Compared to strategy b, strategy c reduces the average in-vehicle time of passengers by 2.5% through compressing inter-station run-time to recover the delay. The timetable optimized based on strategy c saves total travel time of passengers by 3.1% without increasing operating cost when compared to the practical timetable.

A Fuzzy-Theory-Based Social Force Model for Studying the Impact of Alighting Area Width on Alighting and Boarding Behaviors

Alighting and boarding efficiency (A&Be) of passengers plays an important role in the formulation of subway timetable. This paper studies the impact of alighting area width on A&Be based on the improved social force model. This improved model adopts the fuzzy logic theory considering factors of train dwell time and passengers ahead to determine the desired speeds of passengers instead of setting fixed values. The $t$ -test method verifies the validity of the model. The passenger movement dynamics characterized by the alighted or boarded passenger quantities, the desired speeds, and the actual speeds over time is then analyzed. The simulation results indicate when people keep to the civilized rules of alighting first, A&Be will be improved significantly with increasing the alighting area width. Otherwise, the arbitrary increase of alighting area width does not necessarily improve A&Be. The alighting area width during the actual design should be determined by the specific passenger volume and passenger civility. Whether the countermeasure of adding the fences to separate the alighting passengers from the boarding passengers is effective to improve the travel efficiency is finally explored through analyzing the simulation results. Our findings could provide theoretical supports for decision-making of waiting area division on the subway platform and passenger flow management in reality.

Evaluation of Boarding Methods Adapted for Social Distancing When Using Apron Buses.

Social distancing reduces the risk of people becoming infected with the novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2). When passengers are transported from an airport terminal to an airplane using apron buses, safe social distancing during pandemic times reduces the capacity of the apron buses and has led to the practice of airlines keeping the middle seats of the airplanes unoccupied. This article adapts classical boarding methods so that they may be used with social distancing and apron buses. We conduct stochastic simulation experiments to assess nine adaptations of boarding methods according to four performance metrics. Three of the metrics are related to the risk of the virus spreading to passengers during boarding. The fourth metric is the time to complete boarding of the two-door airplane when apron bus transport passengers to the airplane. Our experiments assume that passengers advancing to their airplane seats are separated by an aisle social distance of 1 m or 2 m. Numerical results indicate that the three variations (adaptations) of the Reverse pyramid method are the best candidates for airlines to consider in this socially distanced context. The particular adaptation to use depends on an airline’s relative preference for having short boarding times versus a reduced risk of later boarding passengers passing (and thereby possibly infecting) previously seated window seat passengers. If an airline considers the latter risk to be unimportant, then the Reverse pyramid – Spread method would be the best choice because it provides the fastest time to board the airplane and is tied for the best values for the other two health risk measures.

Empirical Study on the Accuracy and Precision of Automatic Passenger Counting in European Bus Services

Background:An Automatic Passenger Counting system represents a powerful resource for an efficient operational planning of public transport companies, but it gives rise to several challenges such as accuracy and precision, which must be addressed in order to operate successfully.Objective:Unlike previous studies in the North American bus market, this paper evaluates the accuracy and precision of an infrared APC system in a European bus market.Methods:The accuracy is evaluated by considering: (i) the presence/absence of the error and its direction; (ii) the magnitude of the error disregarding the direction and (iii) some tests on the nature of the error. The precision is evaluated by direct and inverse regression models and somet-teston biases.Results:As for accuracy, a small average magnitude of the errors is observed. In addition, the APC accurately measures alighting passengers, while it presents a slight tendency to systematically undercount boarding passengers. As for precision, the amount of measurement error due to the APC system exists and, even if it is relatively contained, it is statistically significant for boarding and alighting passengers.Conclusion:Although one type of APC system is evaluated only on one bus, it seems quite accurate for recording alighting passengers, whereas a correction factor should be applied for boarding passengers.

Absent-Minded Passengers

Passengers board a fully booked airplane in order. The first passenger picks one of the seats at random. Each subsequent passenger takes his or her assigned seat if available, otherwise takes one of the remaining seats at random. It is well known that the last passenger obtains her own seat with probability 1/2. We study the distribution of the number of incorrectly seated passengers, and we also discuss the case of several absent-minded passengers.

Bus passenger counts using Wi-Fi signals: some cautionary findings

Analisa-se a viabilidade de pesquisas sobre usuários de ônibus com base na detecção de endereços MAC WiFi de dispositivos portáteis. A motivação para o estudo decorre da aparente contradição entre casos de sucesso publicados na literatura e resultados de experimentos de campo que realizamos. Requisitos para identificação adequada de passageiros de ônibus são usados como base para avaliar as capacidades do hardware e software de detecção comumente disponíveis. Mais especificamente, os intervalos de tempo decorridos entre as detecções do mesmo dispositivo são tomados como requisito para a determinação do estado do portador do dispositivo e, portanto, a identificação deste como passageiro. Por exemplo, ao realizar pesquisas de embarque e desembarque com equipamentos de detecção instalados a bordo, é necessário que várias detecções ocorram logo após o embarque do passageiro e antes do desembarque, permitindo assim uma estimativa precisa da origem e destino da viagem. Resultados experimentais em ensaios controlados e não controlados indicam que os componentes disponíveis no mercado com software de código aberto podem não fornecer detecções bem-sucedidas. No experimento controlado, encontramos tempos de 40 s para a primeira detecção de 86% dos dispositivos e uma média de 80 s para a segunda detecção de dispositivos. Para o experimento não controlado de viagens em ônibus com carregamento médio, foram encontradas diferenças significativas entre as contagens manuais e os dispositivos detectados. Como resultado dessas observações empíricas, recomenda-se uma avaliação cuidadosa dos esquemas de detecção existentes usados nas pesquisas de número de passageiros.

Manaus Public Port Logistics a Case Study of Boarding and Landing at Passenger Station (ROADWAY)

Logistics for boarding and disembarking at the passenger terminal (roadway) is the organization of all existing operations. This research aimed to analyze and propose improvements in logistics methods in the public port of the city of Manaus – AM that influence the boarding and disembarkation of passengers and goods, taking into account a modern and useful adaptation to the roadway, enabling na efficient handling operation for that meets all who use the port, based on the fact that the movement of passengers must be done safely, and can take into account factors that allow both access to users, as well as goods.

Passenger travel characteristics and bus operational states: a study based on IC card and GPS data in Yinchuan, China

ABSTRACTIn recent years, public transport has been developing rapidly and producing large amounts of traffic data. Emerging big data-mining techniques enable the application of these data in a variety of ways. This study uses bus intelligent card (IC card) data and global positioning system (GPS) data to estimate passenger boarding and alighting stations. First, an estimation model for boarding stations is introduced to determine passenger boarding stations. Then, the authors propose an innovative uplink and downlink information identification model (UDI) to generate information for estimating alighting stations. Subsequently, the estimation model for the alighting stations is introduced. In addition, a transfer station identification model is also developed to determine transfer stations. These models are applied to Yinchuan, China to analyze passenger flow characteristics and bus operations. The authors obtain passenger flows based on stations (stops), bus lines, and traffic analysis zones (TAZ) during weekdays and weekends. Moreover, average bus operational speeds are obtained. These findings can be used in bus network planning and optimization as well as bus operation scheduling.

Occupational safety and health for service crew on passenger ships

The service crew is a vital part of the customer experience on board passenger ships, but also has important duties in the safety organization in case of emergencies. Yet, they are not always recognized as seafarers and have received less attention in research that addresses occupational safety and health in the maritime domain. This study explores the occupational safety and health for the service crew working on Swedish passenger ships. The purpose is to analyze causes of work-related ill-health, investigate and identify important aspects of the physical, organizational and social working conditions. The study has adopted a mixed methods approach, including survey questionnaires, register data on reported long-term sick leave, and field visits on board. Key findings show that service crew on passenger ships report the highest levels of perceived exertion. They also have the highest rates of long-term sick leave lasting 60 days or more. Most diagnoses are related to musculoskeletal and psychological disorders. Important factors in the shipboard work environment include high physical load and strenuous working postures, poor workplace design, long working hours, limited time for recovery, and the perceived mental and emotional load that comes with unclear boundaries between work and recreation and the social interaction with customers and colleagues. The most prominent health promotive factors to reduce the perceived exertion are appropriate manning, time to rest, working with managers that attend to problems and experiencing good working relations with other departments on board.

FORMATION OF THE PASSENGER ORIENTATION SYSTEM ON THE PLATFORM OF THE RAILWAY STATIONS OF UKRAINE

In The paper proposes integrated approach to the formation of a system of passenger orientation on the platforms of Ukrainian railway stations: sectorization; additional information of variable and constant type; development functions for the mobile app. For the theoretical substantiation of the proposed orientation system in the work using the simulation tool AnyLogic, simulations of different scenarios of boarding of passengers on trains platform Kharkov-Passenger. Additional features for the passenger mobile application have been developed. This will reduce the disorientation of passengers, improve the quality of service at the stations and increase the reliability of the train schedule at the passenger stations of Ukraine. The practical experience application of the above measure in the countries of Western Europe and the countries of Asia has proved his effective. Many scientific works are devoted to the study of building efficient passenger orientation systems at railway stations. These studies are based on research on the theory and practice of navigation (Wayfinding). In the tasks of research it is important to solve the problems of imperfection of information and information support of passengers at the railway stations of Ukraine; improve the quality of passenger service; improve and propose an effective system of functional-time-spatial organization of passenger flows; reduce the impact of inconvenience on passengers on platforms that put them in a stressful state and, as a consequence, reduce the level of danger on station platforms. The higher the level of service, the more passengers will use rail services, but it should be remembered that there should be a balance between increasing the level of service and the number of services and the cost of transporting passengers. Otherwise passenger traffic will not be profitable. Thus, the improvement of the system of orientation of passengers at the railway stations of Ukraine is urgent and requires a decision. Further investigation should investigate the application of the proposed passenger orientation systems to conventional long-distance passenger trains.

SERVICE CATCHMENT OF MASS RAPID TRANSIT (MRT) FEEDER BUS: A PRELIMINARY STUDY OF T461 ROUTE TAMAN KAJANG UTAMA

The planning and development of rail services require various considerations. Land availability, land use, catchment, route matching, infrastructure fitting, barrier free and micro-climate friendly designs are some of the factors heeded prior to such installations. A deviation between designated and highly demanded service area in urban sprawl zones of the city has been occurring in many Malaysian cities. These gaps have led to the mismatch between origin/destination of passengers and planned locations of train stations and its feeder bus stops. As such, rail services become less accessible to populations with the highest demands. This paper discusses the preliminary findings from a pilot study which seeks to calibrate the research instrument and validate preliminary findings before actual data collection for the purpose of determining the service catchment of the T461 feeder bus in Kajang MRT Station. The Garmin GPS device acts as the research instrument to obtain coordinates of locations where passengers board and alight feeder buses. On-board surveys and comparison analyses are methods that have been used to obtain the optimum GPS coordinates of the bus stop locations. The preliminary findings indicate that the research instrument is ready to be used for actual data collection and geospatial analysis to determine the service catchment of the T461 feeder bus service.

SERVICE CATCHMENT OF MASS RAPID TRANSIT (MRT) FEEDER BUS: A PRELIMINARY STUDY OF T461 ROUTE TAMAN KAJANG UTAMA

The planning and development of rail services require various considerations. Land availability, land use, catchment, route matching, infrastructure fitting, barrier free and micro-climate friendly designs are some of the factors heeded prior to such installations. A deviation between designated and highly demanded service area in urban sprawl zones of the city has been occurring in many Malaysian cities. These gaps have led to the mismatch between origin/destination of passengers and planned locations of train stations and its feeder bus stops. As such, rail services become less accessible to populations with the highest demands. This paper discusses the preliminary findings from a pilot study which seeks to calibrate the research instrument and validate preliminary findings before actual data collection for the purpose of determining the service catchment of the T461 feeder bus in Kajang MRT Station. The Garmin GPS device acts as the research instrument to obtain coordinates of locations where passengers board and alight feeder buses. On-board surveys and comparison analyses are methods that have been used to obtain the optimum GPS coordinates of the bus stop locations. The preliminary findings indicate that the research instrument is ready to be used for actual data collection and geospatial analysis to determine the service catchment of the T461 feeder bus service.