A two-factor evaluation of bus delays based on GIS-T database and simulation

Abstract: During the urbanization process, vehicles quantity increase with expansion in population. Under this situation, bus transportation system also suffers from bus delay. Bus delay could be caused by a series of factors, for instance, overload passengers, traffic jam, traffic accident and other unpredictable situations. Therefore, choosing crucial elements to efficiently evaluate bus delay is a complex problem in bus delay researches and operation management. The thesis propose an approach to evaluate and explain bus delay by two elements: traffic congestion and passengers’ waiting time. Those two elements would represent the action of external and internal factors on bus operation. This approach could be adaptive to explain the reasons for bus delays, thus to help the optimization of bus lines and give useful information for decision making of transportation company. To achieve the research aim, a GIS-T database was created by combining the GIS database and TIS database. Spatial data as well as attribute data are combined in the database to represent the crucial information for bus delay. Based on GIS-T the database, the impact of traffic congestion and passengers’ waiting time was calculated using the bus line simulation. By implementing the above steps, the main cause of bus delay was studied. A case study application of this method is narrated; focusing on optimize the bus system of Guiyang city, South China. Different methods are used to find out the problem of system and the reason for delay. Moreover, optimization suggestion is proposed according to result. Compared with other methods, the two-factor method has the advantage of locating the reason of delay for each station. The time performance is not superior to other methods. By comparing the situation of adjacent station, the proportion of traffic congestion and overload passenger in bus delay was determined. The two-factor method is applicable for other transit system in different cities which has similar structure as Guiyang. However, for cities with other structure, a feasibility should be made to select an appropriate model.