IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/transb/v81y2015ip2p377-389.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A real-time bus dispatching policy to minimize passenger wait on a high frequency route

Author

Listed:
  • Berrebi, Simon J.
  • Watkins, Kari E.
  • Laval, Jorge A.

Abstract

One of the greatest problems facing transit agencies that operate high-frequency routes is maintaining stable headways and avoiding bus bunching. In this work, a real-time holding mechanism is proposed to dispatch buses on a loop-shaped route using real-time information. Holds are applied at one or several control points to minimize passenger waiting time while maintaining the highest possible frequency, i.e. using no buffer time. The bus dispatching problem is formulated as a stochastic decision process. The optimality equations are derived and the optimal holding policy is found by backward induction. A control method that requires much less information and that closely approximates the optimal dispatching policy is found. A simulation assuming stochastic operating conditions and unstable headway dynamics is performed to assess the expected average waiting time of passengers at stations. The proposed control strategy is found to provide lower passenger waiting time and better resiliency than methods used in practice and recommended in the literature.

Suggested Citation

  • Berrebi, Simon J. & Watkins, Kari E. & Laval, Jorge A., 2015. "A real-time bus dispatching policy to minimize passenger wait on a high frequency route," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 81(P2), pages 377-389.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:transb:v:81:y:2015:i:p2:p:377-389
    DOI: 10.1016/j.trb.2015.05.012
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0191261515001149
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.trb.2015.05.012?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. G. F. Newell, 1974. "Control of Pairing of Vehicles on a Public Transportation Route, Two Vehicles, One Control Point," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 8(3), pages 248-264, August.
    2. Jiamin Zhao & Maged Dessouky & Satish Bukkapatnam, 2006. "Optimal Slack Time for Schedule-Based Transit Operations," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 40(4), pages 529-539, November.
    3. Arnold Barnett, 1974. "On Controlling Randomness in Transit Operations," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 8(2), pages 102-116, May.
    4. James Strathman & Thomas Kimpel & Kenneth Dueker & Richard Gerhart & Steve Callas, 2002. "Evaluation of transit operations: data applications of Tri-Met's automated Bus Dispatching System," Transportation, Springer, vol. 29(3), pages 321-345, August.
    5. Ibarra-Rojas, O.J. & Delgado, F. & Giesen, R. & Muñoz, J.C., 2015. "Planning, operation, and control of bus transport systems: A literature review," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 38-75.
    6. Xuan, Yiguang & Argote, Juan & Daganzo, Carlos F., 2011. "Dynamic bus holding strategies for schedule reliability: Optimal linear control and performance analysis," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 45(10), pages 1831-1845.
    7. Daganzo, Carlos F., 2009. "A headway-based approach to eliminate bus bunching: Systematic analysis and comparisons," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 43(10), pages 913-921, December.
    8. Bartholdi, John J. & Eisenstein, Donald D., 2012. "A self-coördinating bus route to resist bus bunching," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 46(4), pages 481-491.
    9. Mark D. Hickman, 2001. "An Analytic Stochastic Model for the Transit Vehicle Holding Problem," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 35(3), pages 215-237, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Zhang, Shuyang & Lo, Hong K., 2018. "Two-way-looking self-equalizing headway control for bus operations," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 280-301.
    2. Andres, Matthias & Nair, Rahul, 2017. "A predictive-control framework to address bus bunching," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 123-148.
    3. Bian, Bomin & Zhu, Ning & Meng, Qiang, 2023. "Real-time cruising speed design approach for multiline bus systems," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 170(C), pages 1-24.
    4. Sánchez-Martínez, G.E. & Koutsopoulos, H.N. & Wilson, N.H.M., 2016. "Real-time holding control for high-frequency transit with dynamics," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 1-19.
    5. Vismara, Luca & Chew, Lock Yue & Saw, Vee-Liem, 2021. "Optimal assignment of buses to bus stops in a loop by reinforcement learning," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 583(C).
    6. Gkiotsalitis, K. & Alesiani, F., 2019. "Robust timetable optimization for bus lines subject to resource and regulatory constraints," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 128(C), pages 30-51.
    7. Klumpenhouwer, W. & Wirasinghe, S.C., 2018. "Optimal time point configuration of a bus route - A Markovian approach," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 117(PA), pages 209-227.
    8. Dai, Zhuang & Liu, Xiaoyue Cathy & Chen, Zhuo & Guo, Renyong & Ma, Xiaolei, 2019. "A predictive headway-based bus-holding strategy with dynamic control point selection: A cooperative game theory approach," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 125(C), pages 29-51.
    9. Gkiotsalitis, K. & Cats, O., 2021. "At-stop control measures in public transport: Literature review and research agenda," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 145(C).
    10. Li, Shukai & Liu, Ronghui & Yang, Lixing & Gao, Ziyou, 2019. "Robust dynamic bus controls considering delay disturbances and passenger demand uncertainty," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 88-109.
    11. Petit, Antoine & Ouyang, Yanfeng & Lei, Chao, 2018. "Dynamic bus substitution strategy for bunching intervention," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 1-16.
    12. Federico Malucelli & Emanuele Tresoldi, 2019. "Delay and disruption management in local public transportation via real-time vehicle and crew re-scheduling: a case study," Public Transport, Springer, vol. 11(1), pages 1-25, June.
    13. Zhang, Wei & (Ato) Xu, Wangtu, 2017. "Simulation-based robust optimization for the schedule of single-direction bus transit route: The design of experiment," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 203-230.
    14. Wu, Weitiao & Liu, Ronghui & Jin, Wenzhou, 2016. "Designing robust schedule coordination scheme for transit networks with safety control margins," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 93(PA), pages 495-519.
    15. Xuan, Yiguang & Argote, Juan & Daganzo, Carlos F., 2011. "Dynamic bus holding strategies for schedule reliability: Optimal linear control and performance analysis," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 45(10), pages 1831-1845.
    16. Delgado, Felipe & Munoz, Juan Carlos & Giesen, Ricardo, 2012. "How much can holding and/or limiting boarding improve transit performance?," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 46(9), pages 1202-1217.
    17. Daganzo, Carlos F. & Pilachowski, Josh, 2009. "Reducing bunching with bus-to-bus cooperation," Institute of Transportation Studies, Research Reports, Working Papers, Proceedings qt0551g0zw, Institute of Transportation Studies, UC Berkeley.
    18. Petit, Antoine & Lei, Chao & Ouyang, Yanfeng, 2019. "Multiline Bus Bunching Control via Vehicle Substitution," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 126(C), pages 68-86.
    19. Ibarra-Rojas, O.J. & Delgado, F. & Giesen, R. & Muñoz, J.C., 2015. "Planning, operation, and control of bus transport systems: A literature review," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 38-75.
    20. Liang, Shidong & Zhao, Shuzhi & Lu, Chunxiu & Ma, Minghui, 2016. "A self-adaptive method to equalize headways: Numerical analysis and comparison," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 33-43.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:transb:v:81:y:2015:i:p2:p:377-389. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/548/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.