Authors share research focusing on the future of transit as we emerge from the effects of Covid and face a landscape that includes transportation network companies (TNCs) and micromobility options. Topics include factors influencing customer demand, finances, sustainability, operator relief locations and evaluation of the impacts and implications of new mobility options that both compete with and may partner with transit agencies.
Full Details about the Poster Session can be found here: Transit's Futures
Authors: Md Amdad Hossen, Md Tanvir Ashraf, Kakan Dey, West Virginia University
Authors: Lamis Ashour, Qing Shen, University of Washington
Authors: The Sk. Md. Mashrur, Kaili Wang,Brenden Lavoie, Khandker Nurul Habib, University of Toronto
The COVID-19 virus has unimaginably disrupted the transit system and its overall functions. Users’ vigilant safety concerns posed by the pandemic and the consequent transit avoidance behavior for a prolonged period could have lasting impacts on their transit preferences, leaving transit agencies to search for effective post-pandemic transit resilience policies. This study examines potential post-pandemic interventions and pandemic-induced psychological attributes impacting the future transit choice behavior of non-transit users of the pandemic. It utilized data from a transit demand and choice adaptation survey in the Greater Toronto Area, Canada. A two-stage model was formulated to jointly capture the prepandemic transit usage choices of those who did not make transit trips during the pandemic and respective post-pandemic transit choices for these user groups. The models depicted that the postpandemic transit choices were inversely affected by one’s pandemic concerns, while the choices were positively influenced by respondents’ views on post-pandemic transit usage and keeping the adopted safety policies in place. Regarding the conventional level of service attributes, paid park and ride facilities enhanced the probability of post-pandemic transit choice almost by 15% for occasional users, while the changes due to reliable service ranged from 10-11% for pre-pandemic users. Analogous propensity was seen for fare schemes offering free transfers between cross borders and 25% or more off-peak discounts on base fare. Conversely, more direct transit routes and increased parking costs by vehicular modes post the pandemic encourage travelers to retake transit.
Authors: Festival Godwin Boateng, Columbia Climate School/Earth Institute-New York
As with other street-based workers, public transport operators in the United States (US) face a great deal of personal hygiene uncertainty while on the job. There is a general lack of public toilets in the cities with only a few public transport facilities equipped with toilets. Even where restrooms are available, sanitary and safety concerns, schedule pressures and traffic, vague and unrealistic procedures for securing and leaving vehicles tend to undermine operators’ access. Concerns about embarrassment or negative passenger reaction and fear of disciplinary actions also tend to discourage public transport operators from using restrooms. As a result, many operators are forced to reduce fluid and food intake and avoid taking urination-affecting medications for fear of conflicting their work schedules with their excretory needs. Others have developed “systems” to “hold it in”. In unbearable circumstances, however, they release themselves into cups/bottles/piles of newspapers and diapers while others do it in bushes/gutters/tunnels and on train tracks, and bus tires. Much has been written about the litany of personal harms (including the urinary tract and kidney infections) linked to public transport operators’ deficient access to toilet. Much less, however, is known about the problem’s impact on sustainable public transport including its undermining effects on safe and pleasant public transport experience, recruiting and retaining qualified operators, and efficient scheduling and reliability of public transport systems. This paper fills this gap in US toilet and transportation research, and aims to stimulate a social mental shift to demand and support prioritizing access to more safe and clean toilets in transportation and urban planning.
Authors: Madina Ly - HEC Paris, Ramandeep Singh & Daniel Graham, Imperial College London
Community-level non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) have been implemented globally throughout the Covid-19 pandemic at substantial economic and social cost. NPIs aim to reduce societal interactions, and in turn disease transmission, however their effectiveness has been the subject of debate. In this paper, we apply causal inference methods on extensive and unique data to evaluate the performance of NPIs on one important dimension of societal interaction: mobility via mass transit networks. Specifically, we apply a regression discontinuity design (RDD) approach to quantify the effectiveness of full lockdowns, partial lockdowns, and "soft" measures (no lockdowns) on ridership levels for 28 international urban metro networks. Aggregated across all metros and all severity levels, we find that lockdowns are effective in reducing mobility, with an average ridership reduction of 41.4% (95% CI: -50.8%, -30.6%) at the imposition of the first set of lockdowns in 2020. At the lifting of the first set of lockdowns, an average ridership increase of 14.5% (95% CI: 7.7%, 26.5%) is observed, thus indicating asymmetrical ridership recovery which is likely due to reduced behavioural preferences for travel. At both the imposition and easing of the first set of lockdowns, full lockdowns have the greatest degree of impact on ridership, followed by soft measures, and partial lockdowns. The findings provide evidence that could be used to support decision making both by public health bodies about the effectiveness of lockdown measures, and by transit operators in managing ridership fluctuations under pandemic conditions.
Authors: Hannah King, Jacob Wasserman, Brian Taylor - University of California, Los Angeles
COVID-19 upended transit use, finance, and management. To investigate these effects two years into the pandemic, we conducted 21 semi-structured interviews with senior managers at transit agencies across California. We found that the pandemic generated many operational and managerial challenges for transit agencies. Ridership plummeted, then slowly recovered, but is still well below pre-pandemic levels at most agencies. Commuter trips to and from major job centers have been especially slow to return. In response to decreased demand, public health concerns, and uncertain finances, many agencies cut service and spending in the early on. As a result, fare revenues declined, in some cases precipitously. However, federal pandemic relief funds were essential in filling budgetary gaps and have proven effective in stabilizing finances, preventing layoffs, and maintaining service. Other sources of transit funding also bounced back robustly. Our interviews suggest that, though transit agencies experimented with free fares, few fareless programs were made permanent. Current challenges include considerable uncertainty associated with future travel demand, looming financial shortfalls at formerly high-farebox recovery systems that are still drawing on federal funds to backfill fare revenue losses, and protracted labor shortages of drivers and mechanics that are preventing many systems from providing desired levels of service.
Authors: Filippos Alogdianakis, Loukas Dimitriou, University of Cyprus
Sustainability assessments are used in different areas to evaluate a project’s or system’s impacts on the economy, environment and society. Decision-makers can use sustainability assessments to perceive an existing or under consideration system’s effect on society and decide on corrective actions. Transport systems are dynamic and extend spatially with infrastructures and services. Thus, methodological frameworks are required for unravelling transport systems’ sustainability to their spatio-temporal dependencies. Public transport is arguably considered the backbone of today’s urban mobility ecosystem and is generally regarded as an important element of the sustainable mobility paradigm. Moreover, given the –typically- vast investment for their deployment, public transport systems evaluation can assist in assessing the expenditure distribution of the system and suggest corrective actions that maximize welfare gains under financial, social and environmental criteria. This study develops a Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA) framework where a public transport system is segmented and assessed into three levels: stops, lines and administrative areas. Stop, and line levels incorporate essential characteristics allowing their independent evaluation. The assessment of administrative areas aggregates characteristics from previous levels, spatially distributing the public transport system’s evaluation. By incorporating additional socio-demographic data, the administrative area level’s assessment links the evaluated transport system to societal characteristics, enhancing the decision maker’s perspective. The framework is showcased with Nicosia’s currently redesigned public bus transport system.
Authors: Avani Aravind - University of Memphis, Suvin P. Venthuruthiyil - Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad, Sabya Mishra - University of Memphis, Candace Brakewood - University of Tennessee
The objective of public transportation agencies is to maximize available resources in terms of cost and vehicle fleet in order to provide customers with high-quality and reliable services. The growing demand for on-demand mobility services has resulted in a number of public-private partnerships, in which public transit agencies and mobility companies collaborate to expand transit service coverage. Nonetheless, a number of collaborations have failed because of financial restraints and lower ridership. Although fixed route public transit and on-demand services perform effectively in numerous areas, their integration is frequently overlooked. This study investigates and proposes a viable modeling framework that integrates a Fixed Route Transit (FRT) network component and an on-demand component of either or both local Demand Responsive Transit (DRT) services and Transportation Network Company (TNC) services that can enhance connectivity by providing first-mile-last-mile and door-to-door services. This paper presents a decision framework to assist stakeholders evaluate the integrated mobility service system's costs and benefits. In this context, seven scenarios for integrating DRT and TNC into the existing FRT network are identified and assessed using an Agent-Based Simulation Model. For each origin-destination pair, the simulation results determine the best or preferred scenario in terms of overall system cost. According to the simulation results, 60% of trip makers chose the integrated scenario, whereas 40% opted for the non-integrated base case scenario. However, this apparent inclination for integration suggests that such a system can serve as a feeder service for enhancing the traditional fixed route transportation system.