Envisioning an emission diet: application of travel demand mechanisms to facilitate policy decision making

Emission reduction strategies are gaining attention as planning agencies work towards adherence to air quality conformity standards. Policymakers struggling to reduce greenhouse gases (GHG) must grapple with a growing number of travel demand policies. To consider any of these emerging demand mechanisms as a viable option to meet emission targets, planners and policymakers need tools to better understand the implications of such policies on travel behavior. In this paper we present an integrated multimodal travel demand and emission model of four policy strategies; presenting GHG and air pollutant reduction results at a very detailed level. Multiple policy outcomes are compared within a single modeling framework and study area. The results reveal that while no one demand mechanism is likely to reduce emissions to a level that meets policy-maker’s goals; a first-best pricing strategy that incorporates marginal social costs is the most effective emission reduction mechanism. Implementing such a mechanism may offer total emission reductions of up to 24 %. However, the efficacy of this strategy must be weighed against difficulties of establishing efficient pricing, a costly implementation, and substantial negative impacts to non-highway facilities. Decision makers must select a mixture of pricing and land use strategies to achieve emission goals on all road facilities.     

Taxicab deregulation: Economic consequences and regulatory choices

The regulation of taxicab services is receiving an increasing amount of attention by city governments. At issue are the questions of whether local regulations should limit the supply of taxicabs and whether the regulations should control taxi fares.Recently, deregulation has become a popular suggestion; however, little empirical or theoretical evidence has existed to indicate the effects of taxi deregulations. This paper discusses these effects within a framework of eight regulatory scenarios involving different price, entry, and industry concentration factors. The analysis provides support for a public brokerage function.The preparation of this paper was supported, in part, by a contract from the Urban Mass Transportation Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation, Washington, DC.     

The allocation of buses in heavily utilized networks with overlapping routes

Many transit systems outside North America are characterized by networks with extensively overlapping routes and buses frequently operating at, or close to, capacity. This paper addresses the problem of allocating a fleet of buses between routes in this type of system; a problem that must be solved recurrently by transit planners. A formulation of the problem is developed which recognizes passenger route choice behavior, and seeks to minimize a function of passenger wait time and bus crowding subject to constraints on the number of buses available and the provision of enough capacity on each route to carry all passengers who would select it. An algorithm is developed based on the decomposition of the problem into base allocation and surplus allocation components. The base allocation identifies a feasible solution using an (approx.) minimum number of buses. The surplus allocation is illustrated for the simple objective of minimizing the maximum crowding level on any route. The bus allocation procedure developed in this paper has been applied to part of the Cairo bus system in a completely manual procedure, and is proposed to be the central element of a short-range bus service planning process for that city.     

High speed rail market projection: Survey design and analysis

This paper summarises work done to assess the market potential and likely financial performance of a planned high-speed rail link connecting Sydney, Canberra and Melbourne, under a variety of scenarios concerning the services offered and the possible market responses of the competing transport modes in the corridor. In the Australian context, such a link has the characteristics of an essentially new transport mode since existing rail services are extremely poorly developed. The expectation was that generated demand could be a substantial part of the overall ridership. A programme of market research was commissioned by the private consortium considering the project, designed to support forecasting models capable of predicting both diverted and generated travel on the new service. A major survey of current travellers was conducted in 1988, followed by an extensive collection of stated preference evidence about the factors affecting the travel decisions of both existing travellers and those who had not recently made any journeys in the corridor. The paper focuses mainly on the design and organisation of the surveys, on the analysis approach, and on the methods used to generate forecasts for simulated populations and scenarios.     

An equilibrium algorithm for the spatial aggregation problem of traffic assignment

Present traffic assignment methods require that all possible origins and destinations of trips taking place within a study area be represented as if they were taking place to and from a small set of points or centroids. Each centroid is supposed to represent the location of all trip-ends within a given zone, and this necessarily misrepresents points located at the edges of the zone.In order to alleviate this problem (which we refer to as the spatial aggregation problem) one could use smaller zones and more centroids, but existing traffic assignment algorithms cannot efficiently handle many centroids.This paper introduces an algorithm procedure which is designed to handle a substantially larger number of centroids. In the paper that follows, the technique is further developed to take into account a continuous distribution of population.     

Some promising innovations in taxicab operations

Several shared-ride passenger transportation services which could be offered by taxicabs are currently prohibited in U.S. cities by state or local regulations. Although relaxation of these regulations has been advocated on numerous occasions, little regulatory change has occurred to date. Moreover, the taxicab industry has rarely been considered as a potential provider for publicly subsidized transportation services. This paper discusses several promising innovations in taxicab service provisions and subsidy mechanisms which have been implemented or proposed recently in U.S. cities. The paper argues for more well-designed experimentation with such innovations as a means of stimulating greater interest on the part of planners, policy-makers, regulators, and public transportation operators in broadening the role of taxicabs in urban transportation.     

Controlling Structural Deformation of Surrounding Rock Passed by a Deep-Buried Tunnel北大核心CSCD

Layered rock masses with rapid and serious initial deformation and anisotropy regarding the spatial dis-tribution of the failure are encountered during the construction of many large and deeply buried tunnels on the Lan-zhou-Chongqing railway. It is difficult to deal with the resulting problems with conventional control measures, and additional support measures are frequently needed, which significantly affects construction. Focusing on this special large non-linear deformation, the failure mechanism of the large structural deformation of layered rock masses is thor-oughly analyzed by geological site surveys, laboratory tests, site tests and 3DEC discrete element numerical simula-tion. The research results show that high geostress induces rapid and strong squeezing deformation after excavation in low-strength rock masses, and anisotropy of the layered rock mass controls the stress redistribution after excava-tion and the asymmetrical distribution of tunnel section deformation. Based on the asymmetric deformation mecha-nism of the rock mass, a directional support measure for the disturbance anisotropy of the layered rock mass is pro-posed as a rock mass control to reinforce it in an active way. © 2018, Editorial Office of "Modern Tunnelling Technology". All right reserved.     

Model Test on Mechanism of Shear Resistance Borne by Concrete Shear Key and Friction of Element Joint of the Immersed Tunnel北大核心CSCD

By scale model tests, it proves the mechanism mode of shear resistance borne by friction of contact area and concrete shear key in different contact stress states and cushion thicknesses of shear key. The results show that friction plays a significant role on shear resistance of element joint. © 2018, Editorial Office of "Modern Tunnelling Technology". All right reserved.     

Back Analysis of Surrounding Rock Mechanical Parameters of Underground Caverns Based on Genetic Algorithm北大核心CSCD

Surrounding rocks are the main bearing structure of underground caverns, and mechanical parameters used in design and analysis affect the result reliability directly. Based on the monitoring data of surrounding rocks of a water diversion tunnel and genetic algorithm, secondary development of software ABAQUS was conducted, related genetic algorithm was programmed to back analyze the mechanical parameters of surrounding rocks of underground caverns, then a comparison between the calculated parameters and the designed parameters was taken to discuss the rationality of the designed parameters. The results show that the inversion values are larger than the designed ones, and the displacements calculated by the inversion parameters are smaller than that of the original parameter values, showing that the parameters adopted in design are safe. The analysis results prove that the method proposed in this paper is available for parameter analysis in similar projects. © 2018, Editorial Office of "Modern Tunnelling Technology". All right reserved.