Time use in travel surveys and time use surveys – Two sides of the same coin?

An in-depth understanding of travel behaviour determinants, including the relationship to non-travel activities, is the foundation for modelling and policy making. National Travel Surveys (NTS) and time use surveys (TUS) are two major data sources for travel behaviour and activity participation. The aim of this paper is to systematically compare both survey types regarding travel activities and non-travel activities. The analyses are based on the German National Travel Survey and the German National Time Use Survey from 2002.The number of trips and daily travel time for mobile respondents were computed as the main travel estimates. The number of trips per person is higher in the German TUS when changes in location without a trip are included. Location changes without a trip are consecutive non-trip activities with different locations but without a trip in-between. The daily travel time is consistently higher in the German TUS. The main reason for this difference is the 10-min interval used. Differences in travel estimates between the German TUS and NTS result from several interaction effects. Activity time in NTS is comparable with TUS for subsistence activities.Our analyses confirm that both survey types have advantages and disadvantages. TUS provide reliable travel estimates. The number of trips even seems preferable to NTS if missed trips are properly identified and considered. Daily travel times are somewhat exaggerated due to the 10-min interval. The fixed time interval is the most important limitation of TUS data. The result is that trip times in TUS do not represent actual trip times very well and should be treated with caution.We can use NTS activity data for subsistence activities between the first trip and the last trip. This can potentially benefit activity-based approaches since most activities before the first trip and after the last trip are typical home-based activities which are rarely substituted by out-of-home activities.     

Residential built environment and walking activity: Empirical evidence of Jane Jacobs’ urban vitality

This study intends to empirically verify Jacobs’ urban vitality theory, which was based on the observations of her New York City neighborhood in the mid-20th century. To examine the relationship between the residential built environment and walking activity, we used telephone survey data consisting of 1823 valid samples from across Seoul, a city characterized by a high population density and a well-established public transportation system. Respondents were asked questions about their residential location, their demographic and socioeconomic characteristics, and their walking activities. This study then used geographic information systems to measure objective indicators of built environment variables within 500-meter buffer areas based on the home addresses of the respondents. Then, this study constructed multilevel regression models with walking activity as the dependent variable. Our results indicated that walking activity is associated with Jacobs’ six conditions for urban vitality, including land use mix, density, block size, building age, accessibility, and border vacuums.     

Multi-objective optimization for asphalt pavement maintenance plans at project level: Integrating performance,cost and environment

Traditionally, asphalt pavement maintenance mainly considers pavement performance and cost and largely ignores the environment while substantial amount of environmental burdens are released in the process. In this study, a multi-objective optimization model was developed integrating the three elements in order to optimize the asphalt pavement maintenance plans at the project level. Pavement performance element was decided as the multiplier of pavement serviceability index and traffic volume. Cost element was represented by the net present value, including components of agency cost, vehicle operation cost and salvage value. Environmental element, integrating energy consumption, global warming potential, acidification potential and respiratory effects potential, was measured by the life cycle assessment model. A hypothetic asphalt pavement maintenance case study was conducted using the developed multi-objective optimization model and harvested 103 sets of feasible combinations of maintenance plans, each of which is non-dominated by the others. Trade-offs analysis was performed among the three objectives and visualized in both two- and three-dimension forms. It is found there is an opportunity of reducing the cost and environmental impacts to 80.3% and 77.8% and increasing the pavement performance to 146.6% compared to the base case. However, they are mutually compromised and cannot be reached simultaneously. The developed model reveals the quantitatively interactive relationship of the three objectives and helps optimize the asphalt pavement maintenance plans.     

采空区地层变形产生的隧道附加荷载及变形容许值计算与分析

文章分别计算了采空区上方地层弯曲时对隧道产生的附加荷载q1、q2及地层水平应变时对隧道产生的附加荷载qH,并推导出了采空区地层容许弯曲变形和水平应变数值.结果表明,现行交通部《采空区公路设计与施工技术细则》规定的采空区地基容许变形值较为笼统且偏大,结构偏于不安全.最后,文章根据计算结果对比,对不同围岩级别提出了更严格、更安全、更有针对性和可操作性的隧道对采空区地层变形限制要求,以供广大隧道工作者参考使用.     

六宜路底面层沥青混合料组成优化设计分析

底面层是沥青路面结构层中承上启下的重要层位,文章结合六宜路沥青路面施工实例,以骨架密实型为目标对底面层沥青混合料配合比进行了优化设计分析,并通过室内试验与施工质量检测,验证了生产配合比优化后的沥青混合料的路用性能与施工质量。     

基于正装迭代法的斜拉桥二次调索计算方法研究

索力计算是斜拉桥二次调索的关键技术环节。文章以一座采用二次调索施工的斜拉桥为例,介绍了运用结合影响矩阵的正装迭代法计算斜拉桥二次调索施工索力的方法,并通过施工过程仿真分析,验证了该方法计算结果精确,能有效控制斜拉桥施工过程的内力与线形,确保设计成桥状态得以实现。     

西部某交通勘察设计企业发展战略转型研究

文章以西部某交通勘察设计企业为研究对象,对当前交通勘察设计企业所面临的内外部形势进行分析,并针对企业转型发展中所存在的问题,提出以创新为驱动的发展模式,总结归纳出推动企业可持续发展的相关对策,对类似交通勘察设计企业的转型发展具有一定的参考和指导意义。     

Optimization of transport investment and pricing policies: the role of transport pricing in network design

This paper investigates the role of transport pricing in network design and describes two facts about flow pattern in a transportation system. The first, illustrated by an example of Braess paradox, is that adding a new link to the network does not necessarily minimize the total travel time. The second is that introducing of appropriate toll pricing may reduce not only the total network time but also the travel time for each individual traveller. It follows with the investigations of different system objectives and different pricing policies (only toll pricing and distance‐based pricing are considered), and shows how they affect the system performance and flow pattern. Lastly, a systematic optimization process is proposed for integrated planning of transport network and pricing policies.     

Direct formulation and algorithms for the probit-based stochastic user equilibrium traffic assignment problem

This paper proposes simple and direct formulation and algorithms for the probit-based stochastic user equilibrium traffic assignment problem. It is only necessary to account for random variables independent of link flows by performing a simple transformation of the perceived link travel time with a normal distribution. At every iteration of a Monte-Carlo simulation procedure, the values of the random variables are sampled based on their probability distributions, and then a regular deterministic user equilibrium assignment is carried out to produce link flows. The link flows produced at each iteration of the Monte-Carlo simulation are averaged to yield the final flow pattern. Two test networks demonstrate that the proposed algorithms and the traditional algorithm (the Method of Successive Averages) produce similar results and that the proposed algorithms can be extended to the computation of the case in which the random error term depends on measured travel time.     

Large-scale evacuation network optimization: a bi-level control method with uncertain arterial demand

To improve the efficiency of large-scale evacuations, a network aggregation method and a bi-level optimization control method are proposed in this paper. The network aggregation method indicates the uncertain evacuation demand on the arterial sub-network and balances accuracy and efficiency by refining local road sub-networks. The bi-level optimization control method is developed to reconfigure the aggregated network from both supply and demand sides with contraflow and conflict elimination. The main purpose of this control method is to make the arterial sub-network to be served without congestion and interruption. Then, a corresponding bi-objective network flow model is presented in a static manner for an oversaturated network, and a Genetic Algorithm-based solution method is used to solve the evacuation problem. The numerical results from optimizing a city-scale evacuation network for a super typhoon justify the validity and usefulness of the network aggregation and optimization control methods.