Should we abandon activity type analysis? Redefining activities by their salient attributes

This paper poses a challenge and begins a search. The challenge is to reconsider the usefulness of traditional activity types (“work”, “shopping”, etc.) in the understanding and modelling of travel behaviour. The search is for the more salient attributes of activities that may serve to better explain complex travel behaviours—such as activity scheduling and tour formation. In particular, this paper focuses on explicit measures of the spatial, temporal and interpersonal flexibility of activities, along with several traditional attributes (frequency, duration, involved persons, travel time, and location). Data from a recent in-depth week-long activity scheduling survey was used to define and compare these attributes. Results show that considerable variability in the attributes between and within traditional activity groups is evident. This casts considerable uncertainty on assumptions that statically assign levels of spatial, temporal, and interpersonal flexibility to any given activity type. A Principal Components Analysis further revealed eight new distinct clusters of activities that share like attributes. The relative role of each attribute in each component is examined, and subjective interpretations emerged (e.g., “Long and frequent”, “Space and time flexible” “Social networking”). The implications of these results for future model development and research are discussed. Future research should continue to expand the search for salient attributes and link them more directly to decision processes.     

信号交叉口增量延误分析

为了对交通信号控制参数进行优化,需对交叉口延误进行定量分析与计算.对已有的平面信号交叉口增量延误模型提出了改进,并且对该模型进行了校正.针对交叉口处于非饱和与过饱和状态下的交通状况,用排队论分析并推导了交叉口增量延误公式.其结果既完善了现有的延误计算理论,又可为设置信号相位提供理论依据.     

Comparing travel mode and trip chain choices between holidays and weekdays

Choices of travel mode and trip chain as well as their interplays have long drawn the interests of researchers. However, few studies have examined the differences in the travel behaviors between holidays and weekdays. This paper compares the choice of travel mode and trip chain between holidays and weekdays tours using travel survey data from Beijing, China. Nested Logit (NL) models with alternative nesting structures are estimated to analyze the decision process of travelers. Results show that there are at least three differences between commuting-based tours on weekdays and non-commuting tours on holidays. First, the decision structures in weekday and holiday tours are opposite. In weekday tours people prefer to decide on trip chain pattern prior to choosing travel mode, whereas in holiday tours travel mode is chosen first. Second, holiday tours show stronger dependency on cars than weekday tours. Third, travelers on holidays are more sensitive to changes in tour time than to the changes in tour cost, while commuters on weekdays are more sensitive to tour cost. Findings are helpful for improving travel activity modeling and designing differential transportation system management strategies for weekdays and holidays.     

Multi-step prediction of experienced travel times using agent-based modeling

This paper develops an agent-based modeling approach to predict multi-step ahead experienced travel times using real-time and historical spatiotemporal traffic data. At the microscopic level, each agent represents an expert in a decision-making system. Each expert predicts the travel time for each time interval according to experiences from a historical dataset. A set of agent interactions is developed to preserve agents that correspond to traffic patterns similar to the real-time measurements and replace invalid agents or agents associated with negligible weights with new agents. Consequently, the aggregation of each agent’s recommendation (predicted travel time with associated weight) provides a macroscopic level of output, namely the predicted travel time distribution. Probe vehicle data from a 95-mile freeway stretch along I-64 and I-264 are used to test different predictors. The results show that the agent-based modeling approach produces the least prediction error compared to other state-of-the-practice and state-of-the-art methods (instantaneous travel time, historical average and k-nearest neighbor), and maintains less than a 9% prediction error for trip departures up to 60 min into the future for a two-hour trip. Moreover, the confidence boundaries of the predicted travel times demonstrate that the proposed approach also provides high accuracy in predicting travel time confidence intervals. Finally, the proposed approach does not require offline training thus making it easily transferable to other locations and the fast algorithm computation allows the proposed approach to be implemented in real-time applications in Traffic Management Centers.     

Estimating travel time functions for urban roads: options and issues

Travel time functions specify the relationship between the travel time on a road and the volume of traffic on the road. Until recently, the parameters of travel time functions were rarely estimated in practice; however, a compelling case can be made for the empirical examination of these functions. This paper reviews, and qualitatively evaluates, a range of options for developing a set of travel time functions. A hierarchy of travel time functions is defined based on four levels of network detail: area, corridor, route and link. This hierarchy is illustrated by considering the development of travel time functions for Adelaide. Alternative sources of data for estimating travel time functions are identified.

In general, the costs and benefits increase as the travel time functions are estimated at finer levels of network detail. The costs of developing travel time functions include data acquisition costs and analysis costs. The benefits include the potential for reducing prediction errors, the degree of application flexibility and the policy sensitivity of the travel time functions.     

Daily rhythms of suburban commuters’ movements in the Tallinn metropolitan area: Case study with mobile positioning data

The objective of this study is to analyse the diurnal rhythms of city life and its spatial differences in Tallinn, using mobile telephone positioning data. The positioning experiment was carried out in April 2006 over an 8-day period and 15-min intervals, with a random sample of 277 respondents living in new residential areas outside the city of Tallinn.The investigation of the space–time movements and daily distances of respondents showed that the majority of respondents had a similar temporal rhythm related to work, school, services and leisure in the city. Because of the different timing of those activities, the mobile positioning data made it possible to map functional differences in the city. The advantages and disadvantages of mobile positioning data in mapping urban life are discussed in the final section of the study.     

Measuring community reaction to urban transportation impacts using Von Neumann‐Morgenstern utility theory

This paper attempts to measure the impacts of urban transportation system improvements or changes on the community. The community's perceptions of the impacts are represented by its utilities (or disutilities) over various ranges of values of the multiple attributes representing these impacts. The utility technique used in the evaluation is based upon von Neumann‐Morgenstern (vN‐M, 1947) Utility Theory, and is applied using Raiffa's (1970) Fractile Method.

The paper specifically applies the technique to model the perceptions of five subgroups within a community to the impact of a new light rail transit system that is being incorporated in the transportation system of the City of Calgary.

Results of the modeling indicate explicitly how the community changes its perception over ranges of values of the attributes evaluated. Biases of various subgroups within the community over these attributes are also shown. Statistical tests indicate that aggregated utility perceptions can represent the utility perceptions of the individual subgroups quite reasonably.     

多车道道路改扩建工程中最优施工区长度的研究

针对道路改扩建工程,在分析施工区总费用的基础上,通过对交通流运行特征的研究,对车辆通过施工区所产生的各种延误分别进行推导,建立了由施工费用以及车辆延误费用构成的总费用函数模型,得到了道路改扩建工程中不同施工组织条件下最优施工区长度计算公式。微观仿真研究示例表明,最优施工区长度计算方法具有较好的适用性和正确性。有效指导道路维护部门的施工作业,起到节约社会总成本的作用。     

A New Wireless Packet Scheduling Algorithm Based on EDF and Its Application in Multi-bottleneck Networks

Most of current wireless packet scheduling algorithms aim at resource allocation as fairly as possible or maximizing throughput. This paper proposed a new packet scheduling algorithm that aims at satisfying delay requirement and is the improvement of earliest due first (EDF) algorithm in wired networks. The main idea is to classify the packets based on their delay bound, scheduling the most "urgent" class of user and the users that have the best channel condition with higher priority. This algorithm can easily integrate with common buffer management algorithms, when buffer management algorithm cannot accept new arrival packets, try to modify scheduling policy. Packet scheduling algorithms in multiple bottleneck wireless networks were also discussed. A new variable multi-hop factor was defined to estimate the congestion situation (including channel condition) of future hops. Multi-hop factor can be integrated into packet scheduling algorithms as assistant and supplement to improve its performance in multi-bottleneck wireless networks.     

基于历史数据的城市轨道交通列车运行扰动影响分析

列车运行过程受到诸多扰动因素的影响,严重时引起列车运行延误,影响乘客出行.为了判别列车运行扰动、评估影响范围和程度,提出了基于城市轨道交通历史数据的分析方法.根据突发事件类扰动及其相关的列车运行、自动售检票等多源数据,分析扰动的产生和影响规律,包括扰动分类、原因和发生规律,以及扰动持续时间、空间范围和客流相对率.典型城...