Through the storm: Transit agency management in response to climate change

The increase in extreme weather events due to climate change poses serious challenges to public transit systems. These events disrupt transit operations, impair service quality, increase threats to public safety, and damage infrastructure. Despite the growing risk of extreme weather and climate change, little is known about how public managers recognize, experience and address these risks. Using data from a national study of public transit agencies we investigate the types of extreme weather events transit agencies are experiencing, the associated risks, and how agencies are preparing for them. We find that while extreme events are commonly experienced by transit agencies across states and transit managers perceive increased risks from these events, most agencies rely on the traditional emergency management approach to address extreme weather ex post rather than taking a proactive approach to mitigating the adverse weather impact on transit assets and infrastructure ex ante. Managers report that a lack of access to financial resources is the greatest challenge for undertaking adaptation and preparation. We conclude with a discussion of what these findings mean for understanding organizational adaptation behavior as well as climate adaptation policy making.     

Statistical assessment of EV usage potential from user’s perspective considering rapid-charging technology

The aim of the German Government is the licensing of one million electric vehicles (EV) in Germany until 2020. However, the number of battery electric vehicles (EVs) today still is just above 25,000. There are several reasons for deciding against an EV, but especially low battery ranges as well as too long perceived charging duration inhibit the usage of an EV. To eliminate the negative influence of these two reasons on the decision to purchase an EV, a novel charging technology is established. The rapid-charging technology enables the user to recharge the battery to 80% of its state of charge (SOC) within 20–30 min. For the examination of the technology’s impact from (potential) user’s perspective, users and nonusers of battery electric vehicles were questioned about the perceived additional value of public rapid-charging infrastructure by taking into account different trip purposes and running comparisons to regular charging options. The results show an increased perceived value especially for trips with leisure purpose, considering their share of all trip purposes in Germany, according to the MiD 2008. In order to increase the number of licensed EVs in Germany, the study’s results also suggest further dissemination of information on rapid charging which might influence the perceived usefulness of the technology and consequentially the perceived usefulness of an EV.     

Real-time automatic rescheduling strategy for an urban rail line by integrating the information of fault handling

In the operation of urban rails, faults are inevitable, which leads to deviation between the actual timetable and the planned timetable. In nowadays, timetable rescheduling strategies rarely integrate the information of fault handling. In this paper, we develop a real-time automatic rescheduling strategy, which integrates the dynamic information of fault handling. The rescheduled timetable is obtained by a mathematical optimization model, the constraints set of which is automatically generated and adjusted as more information of fault handling is feedback. Compared with the experience-based rescheduling methods, the automatic rescheduling strategy reacts more quickly, and uses the information of fault handling more efficiently. A simulation system for testing the automatic rescheduling strategy is built, which uses the data of the Beijing Yizhuang metro line. Via testing on the simulation system, the effectiveness and efficiency of the automatic rescheduling strategy are validated.     

Vehicle platoon formation using interpolating control: A laboratory experimental analysis

This work addresses the formation phase of automatic platooning. The objective is to optimally control the throttle of vehicles, with a given arbitrary initial condition, such that desired ground speed and inter-vehicular spacings are reached. The steering of the vehicles is also controlled, because the vehicles should track a desired path while forming the platoon. In order to address the platoon formation problem, a cooperative strategy is formed by constructing a discrete state space model which represents the dynamics of a set of n vehicles. Once this model is set, a control method known as Interpolating Control, which aims at regulating to the origin an uncertain and/or time-varying linear discrete-time system with state and control constraints, is utilized. The performance of this control method is evaluated and compared with other approaches such as Model Predictive Control (MPC).Simulations are conducted which suggest that the Interpolating Control approach can be seen as an alternative to optimization-based control schemes such as Model Predictive Control, especially for problems for which finding the optimal solution requires calculations, where the Interpolating Control approach can provide a straightforward sub-optimal solution.In the experimental part of this work, the control algorithms for the platoon formation and path tracking problems are combined, and tested in a laboratory environment, using three mobile robots equipped with wireless routers. Validation of the proposed models and control algorithms is achieved by successful experiments.     

Fully autonomous vehicles: analyzing transportation network performance and operating scenarios in the Greater Toronto Area,Canada

Fully autonomous vehicles (AVs) have the potential to considerably change urban mobility in the future. This study simulates potential AV operating scenarios in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), Canada, and assesses transportation system performance on a regional level. For each scenario, the base capacities of certain types of road links are modified to simulate the theoretical increase in throughput enabled by AV driving behavior. Another scenario examines driverless parking operations in downtown Toronto. Simulation results indicate that the increased attractiveness of freeways relative to other routes leads to slightly increased average travel distance as vehicles divert to access higher capacity road links. Average travel time is found to decrease by up to one-fifth at the 90% AV market penetration level. Concurrently, localized increases in congestion suggest that proactive transportation planning will be needed to mitigate negative consequences of AV adoption, especially in relation to induced demand for personal automobile travel.     

Identifying preferences for public transport investments under a constrained budget

As urban areas face increasing demands for new transport infrastructure to promote a sustainable future with an increasing reality of constrained government budgets, the debate on whether we should focus on rail or bus-based investments continues unabated in many jurisdictions. Associated with the debate is an emotional (or ideological) bias by communities in favour of one mode, especially rail, which carries much sway at the political level as if there is no budget constraint. This paper presents a stated choice experiment to investigate this context as two unlabelled options described by 20 potential drivers of community preferences for improved public transport, where each choice scenario is conditioned on an estimated construction cost and a total annual transport infrastructure budget for the relevant geographical jurisdiction. This is followed by a labelling of each alternative to reveal whether the option is bus rapid transit (BRT) or light rail (LRT) and to establish whether this additional information influences preference revision. Data is collected in all eight capital cities of Australia in mid 2014. Mixed logit models with heteroscedastic conditioning in terms of the cost of the project infrastructure and whether the alternative is labelled BRT or LRT, provide new evidence on the nature and extent of community modal bias in a budget-constrained choice setting. The conclusions are twofold. On the one hand, if a fully compensatory choice rule is assumed (as is common in all previous modal comparison studies), LRT is predominantly preferred over BRT despite budgetary constraints, similarities in quality of service attributes and the opportunity to choose a greater network coverage for a given construction cost. However, when we allow for attribute non-attendance (a semi-compensatory choice rule), the modal bias is no longer a significant driver of preferences.     

Demi-flexible operating policies to promote the performance of public transit in low-demand areas

The efforts of providing attractive transport service to residents in sparse communities have previously focused on operating flexible transit services. This paper identifies a new category of transit policies, called demi-flexible operating policies, to fill the gap between flexible transit services and conventional fixed-route systems. The passenger cost function is defined as the performance measure of transit systems and the analytic work is performed based on a real-world flag-stop transit service, in which we compare its system performance with another two comparable systems, the fixed-route and flex-route services, at expected and unexpected demand levels in order to be closer to reality. In addition, the dynamic-station policy is introduced to assist the flex-route service to better deal with unexpectedly high demand. Experiments demonstrate the unique advantages of demi-flexible operating policies in providing affordable, efficient, and reliable transport service in low-demand operating environments and this work is helpful to optimize the unifying framework for designing public transit in suburban and rural areas.     

基于振动分析的自动扶梯状态监测与预警系统研究

自动扶梯是特种设备,其安全性与乘客的人身安全密切相关.自动扶梯状态监测与预警是为了保证自动扶梯安全性的预测性系统,该系统由传感器、数据采集器和数据分析软件等组成,采用振动分析原理,实现故障预警及维修部件指导,预防故障或事故的发生.该系统已在北京轨道交通项目中使用,通过对项目中的典型案例进行分析,详细阐述该系统应用及运行...     

城市轨道交通车辆基地室外综合管沟的应用研究

室外管线综合设计是城市轨道交通车辆基地设计的重点和难点,通常室外管线多以直埋的方式敷设于地下,但这种方式在设计、施工、运营维护阶段均存在着一些问题,因此提出了在室外设置综合管沟的方式,尽可能解决目前出现的问题.针对相关问题,提出了设置室外综合管沟的必要性和意义,从入沟管线种类分析、综合管沟管线布置原则、断面设计、特殊节...     

城市轨道交通设施安全智能监测预警系统设计

城市轨道交通线网规模和客运量的日益增加对城市轨道交通安全运营的要求越来越高,城市轨道交通设施安全智能监测是轨道交通系统安全运营的重要保障.设计了一种城市轨道交通设施安全智能监测预警系统,实现轨道交通设施监测数据采集、数据传输、数据保存、智能预警功能,对系统功能及布局提出具体的设计要求,同时根据安全性的需求划分预警级别.