Modeling transit passenger travel behaviors in congested network with en-route transit information systems

Abstract

This paper proposes a multi-class schedule-based dynamic transit assignment model to investigate the impacts of En-route Transit Information Systems (ETIS). The proposed model considers simultaneously the departure time and route choices of passengers in congested transit network with ETIS. There are two classes of passengers: those equipped and those unequipped with ETIS. These passengers would make their travel choices to follow the stochastic dynamic user optimal principles, with the equipped passengers having a lower perception variation of the travel cost due to the availability of better information. The numerical example indicates some important insights on passenger travel behaviors and the performance of the transit network with ETIS. The effects of the service cost and service quality of ETIS on the market penetration of ETIS and the total passenger travel cost are assessed under different conditions with various levels of transit passenger demand.