Determination of passengers' perceptions and effects of bus holding strategy using an automatic vehicle location system in Bangkok | |
| Author | Qadir, Fayyaz Mahmood |
| Call Number | AIT Thesis no.TE-05-01 |
| Subject(s) | Motor vehicles Local transit Transportation |
| Note | A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Engineering, School of Engineering and Technology |
| Publisher | Asian Institute of Technology |
| Series Statement | Thesis ; no. TE-05-01 |
| Abstract | The bus transit in Bangkok is offering great accessibility and mobility out of other public transport systems. Having a key importance in public transport, bus transit is continuously losing its magnificent ridership, year by year. It is essential to achieve a sustainable transport system in Bangkok through improving public transport systems and furnishing them with advanced technologies, in turn will attract more passengers from auto users. Therefore, this research concentrates on bus transit through studying the reasons for the declination of bus ridership and asking passengers which attributes of automatic vehicle location (AVL) system are important to them. Lastly, the bus-holding strategy was simulated using PARAMICS (PARAllel MICroscopic Simulator) to know how much potential this strategy has to improve bus performance in Bangkok. An attitudinal on-board survey is conducted on bus route #73, in Bangkok, to know passengers' perceptions about the existing bus operation and willingness to the potential features of AVL system in bus transit. It is noticed from survey that car ownership has not significant effect on passengers' perceptions and willingness. Survey indicates that bus riders rank punctuality of bus arrival and departure on-time, and safety in travel as one of the most important potential features.of AVL systems. Other features of AVL systems like real-time information of bus schedule, and coordination of bus schedules with other buses receive unexpected results in terms of riders' willingness for deploying these features in bus transit. The respondents exhibit their satisfaction for existing attributes of bus service and mention service hour, frequency and seat availability as most important attributes in bus transit. The field observations are also carried out to determine the passengers' waiting time and bus headway variations. Passengers describe their waiting times in attitudinal survey and the actual waiting times at bus stops are compared to each other. This survey reveals that passengers perceive their waiting time many times greater than actual waiting time at bus stops. This research determines the passengers' arrival rate and bus headway variations at major bus stops on selected bus corridor. The surveyed route experiences more than 30 percent cases when bus headway is 5 minutes or less which cause large headway disruptions, leads to bus bunching. This field observation is used first time, for an academic research in Bangkok, to learn about the effects of bus operation on passengers' satisfactions and perceptions. A bus-holding strategy is simulated to regulate headway, using PARAMICS, under different congestion levels. The results reveal a significant reduction in the excess waiting time of bus riders using AVL systems. At the same time, it is also observed that an increase in bus travel time which may have create adverse effect on bus users. This technique might be implemented with trade-off between passengers' waiting time and bus travel time, alongwith some economic analysis for bus users and operators |
| Year | 2006 |
| Corresponding Series Added Entry | Asian Institute of Technology. Thesis ; no. TE-05-01 |
| Type | Thesis |
| School | School of Engineering and Technology (SET) |
| Department | Department of Civil and Infrastucture Engineering (DCIE) |
| Academic Program/FoS | Transportation Engineering (TE) |
| Chairperson(s) | Hanaoka, Shinya; |
| Examination Committee(s) | Yordphol Tanaboriboon;Tripathi, Nitin K. ; |
| Scholarship Donor(s) | Government of Japan; |
| Degree | Thesis (M.Eng.) - Asian Institute of Technology, 2005 |