This paper takes up the Flood Diversion Channel of Sogi Falls as an example of civil engineering facility development against frequent natural disasters, and makes a philosophical treatise about its design possibilities. By confirming non-self-determinism as a characteristic of civil engineering and organising Heidegger’s theory of technology, which focuses on nature, the concepts of ‘Entbergen’, ‘Herstellen’, and ‘schonen’ are extracted. By examining the design of the Flood Diversion Channel, it was confirmed that civil engineering design has the potential to realise these concepts.

The merging support information provision system (DAY2 system) that supports a merging vehicle merging into a main lane has been verified through the field operational test (FOT) on the test track. A section that mimics a merging one on an expressway was prepared, and DAY2 system was installed. After that, we made driven vehicles, and evaluated a vehicle behavior of a merging vehicle using various evaluation indexes depending on whether a merging support information was provided or not. In addition, we set multiple patterns of a length of an acceleration lane and a speed of main lane vehicles in the FOT, and grasped a difference in an effect of an information provision depending on a road structure and a traffic condition at a merging section. As a result, in the FOT, it was clarified that many evaluation indexes were improved by providing an information, and a merging vehicle was able to merge safely and smoothly into a main lane. In terms of success rate of merging, the effect of information provision was large when a length of an acceleration lane was 50 meters and a speed of main lane vehicles was 70km/h.

This study analyzes the effects of situational awareness that changes over time during heavy rain on evacuation action, and examines the framework of an evacuation behavior decision-making model. Typhoon 19 in 2019 landed on the Izu Peninsula before 19:00 on October 12 with a large size and strong force, bringing record-breaking rainfall to Shizuoka Prefecture, the Kanto region, the Koshinetsu region, and the Tohoku region. River flooding and landslides occurred over an extremely wide area, resulting in 99 fatalities and missing persons, 4,008 houses that were completely or partially destroyed, and 70,341 houses that were flooded. Therefore, we conducted a survey of evacuation behavior among residents of 14 prefectures in Tokyo that were affected by the disaster, in March and June 2020. We focused on those who evacuated and those who suffered damage but did not evacuate, analyzed the differences in their intention to evacuate during heavy rains.

The building of applied multiregional economic models, such as a spatial computable general equilibrium (SCGE) models, require the estimation of benchmark equilibrium data due to the limitation of available data. Unfortunately, there is no universal method for estimating benchmark equilibrium data, especially final demand by region. This study compares and analyzes the characteristics of the benchmark data estimated by multiple estimation methods. Furthermore, we applied a SCGE model based on each benchmark data to transportation improvement scenarios. The results suggest that although there are differences in benchmark data for areas near large cities, the impact of the differences on the policy effect analysis is small.

The objective of this study is to increase the number of bus drivers. The actual working environment of the bus business and other industries was compared. The results showed that bus service workers were paid less and had longer working hours than workers in other industries, but had more paid vacations per year. In addition, they were more dissatisfied with “salary,” followed by “sufficient working hours and holidays”. A questionnaire survey was conducted on license holders of heavy vehicles or route bus drivers, asking about their employment intentions. Conjoint analysis was applied to this intention. The average respondent did not find the employment conditions in the bus business attractive when set as the current general employment conditions. Furthermore, we found that it is difficult to increase employment and prevent job turnover simply by providing caregiving and childcare services. However, it was found to be a significant factor in changing employment intentions. The results indicate that caregiving and childcare services can play a supplementary role.

In Japan, telework is becoming a normal aspect of people's lifestyles. In specific, Tokyo metropolitan area has a high rate of telework. An original questionnaire survey was conducted to clarify people's characteristics of outings focusing on attitudes toward telework. As a result, it was revealed that the frequency of exercise outside the home on telework days is higher for those who try to go out as much as possible. Furthermore, the result showed that people who are active in online entertainment are also active in entertainment outside the home and tend to make days not to go out intentionally. However, all the results were not independent of individual attributes such as gender and age, and further analysis is required.

In this study, with the aim of clarifying the relationship between the convenience of public transportation and social population change by age groups, we focused on urban planning areas in local areas nationwide. We analyzed the relationship between the presence or absence of stations and bus stops, the frequency of trains and buses in operation in 2010, and the rate of social population change rate by age groups over the five-year period from 2010 to 2015 in units of 500m mesh. As a result, we clarified that the 0-4 to 5-9 age group tends to increase in society as a whole in local areas, but in urbanized areas, the social increase is relatively small in meshes where trains are frequently operated. In addition, we clarified that the 10-14 to 15-19 and 15-19 to 20-24 age groups tend to decrease in society as a whole in local areas, and the social decline is greater in meshes where there are fewer trains and buses in operation. Furthermore, we clarified that the 20-24 to 25-29 age group tends to increase in society in local areas, but in urbanized areas, the bus stop meshes with more bus service has less social increase.

Estimating the economic value of human loss risk reduction is important in the cost-benefit analysis. Value of Statistical Life (VSL) is commonly used to evaluate the monetary value of human loss risk reduction. In Japan, there have been many studies on the estimation of VSL. In this study, we conducted a meta-analysis of these previous studies. As a result, although there was a large variation in the estimated value of each study, the integrated value of median VSL estimate might be in the range from 200 to 600 million yen and mean VSL estimate might be in the range from 600 to 1,200 million yen.

Two analyses were conducted: the association between transportation and reduced activity among the elderly after cessation of driving, and an examination of environmental factors related to transportation use. Of the respondents to two self-administered surveys of community-dwelling elderly people, 2,579 who were independent in basic activities of daily living and had stopped driving were included in the main analysis. The objective variables for the first analysis were the decrease in frequency of going out and the decrease in walking time. The main explanatory variables for the second analysis were the mode of transportation after driving, and the main explanatory variables were the number of train stations, bus stops, and grocery stores within walking distance. Public transportation and bicycle use were significantly associated with maintaining frequency of going out and walking time. The presence of train stations or bus stops within walking distance was associated with public transportation use, and the presence of grocery was associated with bicycling use.

Store on wheels, such as mobile supermarkets and food trucks, have become increasingly popular in recent years. Mobile stores will be used in a wider variety of situations, not only because they transport goods and services but also because they have the advantage of being less location-sensitive than conventional stores. In this study, we analyzed the impact of activity context (e.g., date, time-frame, and the number of users) and various attributes on preferences based on a web-based stated preference survey in three industries (supermarkets, restaurants, and fitness gyms).

This study proposes a traffic condition estimation method for accidents using sensing data and a traffic flow model. In traffic control, it is important to understand the traffic condition at the time of an accident. Generally, the traffic condition in a target time-space is estimated by using sensing data and a traffic flow model to estimate the complement of unobserved locations. The parameters of the traffic flow model need to be calibrated in advance. However, it is difficult to calibrate the parameters of a traffic flow model in advance because the traffic impact during an accident changes dynamically. In this study, a state-space model is constructed using vehicle detectors, probe data, and variational theory, and simultaneous estimation of parameters and traffic states is attempted. As a result of the validation, it is confirmed that the proposed method can accurately estimate the traffic state at the time of an accident.

In domestic roundabouts, various safety measures such as structural improvements and signage have been implemented, but they often prioritize the perspective of car users. However, there are few cases where roundabouts are installed in areas with high bicycle traffic. As a result, many examples exist where measures such as chevron pavement markings and signage are implemented to guide bicycle travel positions and prevent conflicts with cars. Additionally, analyzing the effectiveness of these measures is challenging due to construction constraints. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to investigate and analyze the actual bicycle usage patterns at roundabouts without pavement markings or similar interventions in order to reveal the characteristics of bicycle usage based on differences in bicycle travel positions. Furthermore, the objective is to contribute to the consideration of bicycle safety measures in future roundabout designs.

In this study, the effect factors of passenger car equivalent values (PCE) for heavy vehicle at signalized intersections are analyzed based on field observations. Particularly, this study focused on the road geometric designs as turning radius and turning angles as well as the traffic characteristics as the proportion of heavy vehicles and semi-trailers. As a result, the traffic characteristics are effective for PCE, and the calculation models of PCE using the proportion of heavy vehicles were proposed.

Congestion at popular sightseeing spots has been a persistent issue predating the COVID-19 pandemic. Understanding tourist behavior is essential for alleviating this problem. Meanwhile, with the spread of social media, tourists now frequently upload their photos online. These photos can serve as valuable resources for identifying the locations that attract tourists. This study aims to shed light on tourist behavior based on their place of residence using their photos and metadata from around Kyoto City. We have devised a methodology to estimate the place of residence and have analyzed the trends in photo locations—locations where tourists took photos—according to their place of residence. By comparing the results of photo locations with the locations visited by foreign tourists (referred to as visited locations) based on the Kyoto Tourism Comprehensive Survey, we demonstrate that there are distinct differences in the trends of photo locations and visited locations depending on the estimated place of residence. Furthermore, certain places are more popular among foreign tourists for both visiting and taking photos, while others are favored by both Japanese and foreign tourists for visiting but specifically attract foreign tourists when it comes to taking photos.

Central Nippon Expressway Company Limited has been conducting “Expressway Renewal Project” in various regions. A previous study conducted by the authors revealed the bottleneck and the traffic capacity during two-way traffic restrictions. However, the conditions under which a bottleneck is determined and the factors that affect traffic capacity have not been clarified.

This study, to clarify these conditions and factors, adds a sample of construction sections, analyses the characteristics of bottleneck locations, and develops a model for estimating traffic capacity during two-way traffic restrictions. The results of the analysis revealed that the bottleneck may be influenced by the ratio of merging, sag order, and lane shift conditions, and that the traffic capacity was affected by the bottleneck, the length of the construction section, the rate of heavy vehicles, and the vertical grade.

On road sections and similar areas, the proportion of fatal accidents where a bicycle is rear-ended by a car is an outstandingly high 5.3%, and about 70% of these occur at night. As a result, it is an urgent issue to plan and maintain a safe and comfortable traffic space for bicyclists at night. This can involve measures to improve visibility, such as installing taillights on bicycles, choosing the proper clothing, and installing road lighting and reflective materials. Although, many studies have been conducted on visibility of bicycle, few studies have conducted on the danger of overtaking maneuvers of cars toward bicycle at night. Therefore, this study analyzed the characteristics of overtaking maneuvers of cars toward bicyclists during the day time and at night time. As a result, significant differences were confirmed in the main effects of the time factor on both the driving speed of cars and the passing distance.

As the division of functions using public transportation networks such as railroads is promoted to form compact and network-type urban structures, the importance of planning wide-area bases is increasing. Furthermore, because the sustainable maintenance of facilities is necessary for core areas that people visit, ascertaining the actual situations of people's movements from a wide-area perspective is necessary for planning. This study specifically examined the movement of people within walking distance of Tokyo metropolitan area railroad stations. Distribution trends in that urban area were identified based on the distance from the center of the city. Results showed the following: 1) The number of clusters with a high car ownership share increases at around 30 km from the city center. and 2) each station walking distance is visited by a group with unbalanced attributes in terms of gender, age, and annual household income.

As Japan enters an era of declining population, public transportation networks that maintain a high level of service at low cost are urgently needed. This paper proposes a normative methodology for studying nodes, which are a fundamental element in public transportation network design. Transportation nodes are identified by means of a network design problem to efficiently transport passengers. Specifically, public transportation lines are aggregated into a shape called a graph spanner, and the points where many demands intersect are considered heuristically. We considered that the solution space of the constructed problem is too large to derive an exact solution, so we constructed an algorithm to derive a solution heuristically using the cross-entropy method, which is one of the meta-heuristics. We confirmed the behavior of the proposed method on a test network and discussed some of the solutions obtained.

In this paper, we proposed a methodology for estimating the recovery curve of the production capacity that considers the impact of lifeline recovery time. Specifically, we modeled the production capacity recovery process under the semi-Markov process framework and applied it to a case study of the business survey data following the 2022 Fukushima offshore earthquake. Also, we proposed a method for estimating the parameters of the sojourn time distribution of the production capacity level conditional on the lifeline recovery time. Moreover, the application of the proposed method to the 2022 Fukushima offshore earthquake illustrated the production capacity recovery process of firms in the disaster affected area. Results suggested that the proposed model is able to quantitatively evaluate the impact of the lifeline recovery speed on the recovery of production capacity, as it estimates the recovery curve conditional on the lifeline recovery time. Results also provided useful information for evaluating the cost-effectiveness of infrastructure recovery countermeasures after seismic disasters.

Existing reservation platforms have limitations such as “searching for services by narrowing down date, time, and location” and “only one reservation can be made in one search action”, making it difficult to search for services based on individual user preferences. To solve this problem, we propose a preference elicitation service search system that extracts preferences through questions to users and searches a set of services. Through laboratory experiments on the Web, we compare the search behavior of an existing reservation platform with that of a preference elicitation service search system, and show that the proposed system can search high-quality facilities for users in a short time.

The Tsunami that struck the Tohoku region after the Great East Japan Earthquake was devastating and updated the perception of Tsunami risk among people living in coastal areas. In Japan, it is anticipated that a huge earthquake with the Nankai Trough as its epicenter will occur in the near future, and it has been pointed out that high-income people in the Pacific coastal areas are migrating to low-risk areas in preparation for the tsunami. This can be interpreted as an undesirable situation where low-income people are left behind in high-risk areas, and it is important to clarify the actual situation. However, it is difficult to verify the existence of such a phenomenon in Japan because data on migration among micro districts and data on income and earnings at the micro-district level have not been made public. Therefore, in this study, we estimated the income-related indices in Shizuoka and Kochi prefectures before and after the Great East Japan Earthquake on a grid basis, and attempted to clarify the reality of this problem by regressing the rate of change on topographical factors related to Tsunami risk.

In recent years, drivers have not always complied with their obligation to give priority to pedestrians, and therefore, improving the rate of pedestrian crossing stops at crosswalks is considered to be important for reducing traffic accidents while crossing the street. This study aims to clarify the structure of an unsignalized pedestrian crossing that allows pedestrians to stand close to the roadway unconsciously and at the same time allows pedestrians to cross safely and securely even when they are close to the roadway. To this purpose, we conducted a VR simulation experiment in which experimental participants wore a head-mounted display and were asked to wait and cross at an unsignalized pedestrian crossing. The results showed that the overhang had the greatest impact on the pedestrian's standing position. Furthermore, the results showed that the overhangs of fences and bollards were effective in reducing the pedestrian's fear.

Estimating of the economic impacts of floods in the industrial sector, various factors other than inundation can be also considered. For example, negative factors such as the long-term damage to critical infrastructure and the shortage of operating funds can affect business activities while other factors, such as transfer production and various BCPs, can reduce the economic impacts. No quantitative analysis of the influence of these factors on the economic impacts and the relationship between the recovery costs and the decline in business profits. In this study, regarding the heavy rain event of July 2018, the economic impacts in the industrial sector in Mabi area, Kurashiki, Okayama Prefecture and Kure, Hiroshima Prefecture (both in Japan) are estimated based on not only the inundation depth but also other factors. The estimation of the economic impacts using a probabilistic model such as recovery cost ratio fragility curves and sales recovery curves developed in previous studies revealed that the decline in business profits was about 0.5 times the recovery costs in Mabi, where the extent of the inundation was large, and about 3 times in Kure. In addition, it was found that the impact of the damage to critical infrastructure accounted for about 30% of the decline in business profits in Mabi.

In the U.K., the Transport Act 1985 liberalized the bus market outside of London, allowing all private operators meeting minimum standards to participate in the market, and allowing them to set their own fare structures, routes, frequency, etc. as long as they meet minimum standards. In principle, the support and intervention of local governments were limited to non-commercial routes only. On the other hand, local governments continue to search for ways to improve service, and the Transport Act 2000, the Local Transport Act 2008, and the Bus Service Act 2017 have established a system of agreements and contracts between local governments and operators. In light of the adverse effects of deregulation, such as rising fares, competition among operators, and complex fare structures, the National Bus Strategy for England was developed in 2021. This paper analyzes the changes in bus-related legislation in the U.K. since deregulation from the perspective of improving regional public transportation services and changing the authority of local governments.

In recent years, the development of walkable spaces has been promoted in a uniform manner in Japan. Under such circumstances, there are attempts to incorporate qualitative perspectives such as pedestrians' walkability and impressions of streets into actual city planning, and we believe that quantitative evaluation of the walkability of streets by focusing on individual attitudes and ideas can contribute to the creation of walking spaces that consider various needs. In this study, we clarified the relationship between walking preferences, consciousness toward residential roads, and perceptions of walkability. Furthermore, we quantitatively showed the effects of street elements such as barriers, width of walkable space, and differentiation of pavements on walkability by the perceptions of walkability.

As the number of elderly people increases, and the number of people who have voluntarily surrendered their driver's license increases, it will become important to support elderly people who have difficulty in going out for shopping, going to hospital, etc., by using private passenger service to transport with private cars to supplement conventional public transport, through volunteer groups and local mutual aid. In this study, the authors conducted a survey of the organizations providing passenger service with private car by hired driver and transfer service with private car by volunteering driver and analyzed situation of organizations such as revenue and expenditure balance, in addition continuity of providing transport services from the perspective of actual conditions, issues, and measures. As a result, the authors found the issues on balance, internal-subsidy, and aged-driver. In addition, that the availability of governmental subsidies income security, and the availability of personnel and income to manage the organizations are the issues for continuity, and that the use of other resources to improve transportation efficiency by shared ride, and the use of personnel and vehicles from other businesses of the organizations are the factors that make it possible to continue operating.

In the Tokushima urban area, traffic congestion caused by detours is expected to result in significant time loss during major road bridge repairs. The objective of this study is to understand the effect of traffic management measures that combine the dispersion of departure times and lane operations during major repairs of major road bridges. The study estimates the effects of traffic demand dispersion by providing information to passing vehicles in the restricted section to induce them to change their departure time, and of traffic capacity optimization by lane operation in the road section of the surrounding bridges. For this purpose, traffic conditions are estimated using traffic simulation to evaluate the effects of traffic management. The results show that the combination of appropriate time dispersion and lane operations may reduce the time loss at the adjacent bridges.

This study analyzes the effects of bus conversions on the population of station areas and the public transportation share of local railroads, considering the number of trains and buses in operation on the routes. Specifically, 104 routes with a traffic density of 4,000 passengers/day or less from 1977 to 1979 were selected, and the effects of the number of trains and buses operated on the routes after conversion and the changes in the number of trains and buses operated before and after conversion on the station population and the public transportation sharing ratio were clarified. Specifically, we found that the conversion of local railroad lines to bus lines decreases the station population and the public transportation sharing ratio compared to the case where the railroad lines remain in operation, and that the difference is statistically significant. The results also show that when the number of buses after conversion and the change in the number of buses before and after conversion are the same as those of railroads, the public transportation sharing ratio declines on the bus conversion route compared to the route with the continuation of railroads, and the difference is statistically significant.

This study compared the differences in the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on transit ridership depending on the length of the analysis period. First, we tested the relationship between the forecast period and the robustness of the Bayesian structural time series model using data only for the period prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, and confirmed that extending the analysis period beyond that of previous studies provides a larger estimate of the short-term impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. We also analyzed differences in short-term effects by attribute. Next, the long-term impact of the COVID-19 spread was analyzed by attribute using local linear trend components extracted by component decomposition of Bayesian structural time series analysis. Especially, we newly introduced a method to quantitatively analyze the time series differences in the local trend components of the two attributes using Bayesian structural modeling and confirmed that it is possible to show time-series differences that are difficult to discern by simple comparison.

This paper aimed to analyze the railway timetables based on cyclic and symmetric rate and show the relationship between adopting cyclic and symmetric timetables and the number of passengers in local cities in Japan. Our results showed that the train frequencies of stations kept or decreased from 2011 to 2019 when the cyclic rate became more than 75%. Our results also showed that the number of passengers significantly increased when cyclic rate became more than 75%, and the number of passengers decreased when symmetric rate became less than 25%.

The capacity of a left-turn lane with pedestrians is calculated using the probability of being able to use the pedestrian gap (i.e., the passing probability of left-turning vehicles). However, this passing probability was established about 40 years ago and has not been changed since then. Furthermore, the specified value is calculated only for pedestrians and does not take bicycles into account, but it is expected to be lower than that for pedestrians only when bicycles are present. Therefore, in this study, pedestrians, bicycles, and left-turning vehicles were observed at several signalized intersections with left-turning lanes. The passing probability was calculated for pedestrian and bicycle traffic, intersection structure, and traffic operation, and the relationship between these factors was analyzed. The results showed that the passing probability is significantly lower when bicycles are mixed with pedestrians, and also affected by the intersection structure and traffic operation.

In order to introduce automated vehicles into society, it is crucial to develop infrastructure that supports autonomous driving on the roads. However, to ensure widespread acceptance among road users, it is important to carefully evaluate the suitability of such projects. In this study, we conducted a thorough cost benefit analysis specifically focused on the creation of dedicated lanes for automated vehicles on expressways. The potential utility of the dedicated lanes is that users of automated vehicles could enjoy, such as the ability to multitask while traveling, thus minimizing time wasted during journeys, while it is worth noting that the dedicated lanes for autonomous vehicles occupy road space and reduce the traffic capacity available for human-driven vehicles, which should be regarded as a potential disutility. This trade-off between the utility and the disutility needs to be considered in the cost benefit analysis. The results of our analysis revealed that the cost-benefit ratio exceeded 1 for all sections of the Shin Tomei Expressway, regardless of the market penetration scenario for automated vehicles. On the other hands, on the Tomei Expressway, the occurrence of congestion-related losses exceeds the benefit of autonomous vehicles when the market penetration rate is low. Nonetheless, in all sections of the Tomei Expressway, tangible benefits were observed if the proportion of automated vehicles on the road exceeded 32%.

One of the new roles of “Michi-no-Eki” which play an important role in regional development, is to function as “transportation hubs” that interconnect different modes of transportation. While the number of Michi-no-Eki that function as transportation hubs is on the increase, at present there is no clear indicator to evaluate their function. This study proposes a quantitative evaluation method for Michi-no-Eki facilities that are assumed to be used by various modes of transportation as transportation hubs, by organizing and systematizing the facilities and services required of Michi-no-Eki as transportation hubs, and by analyzing the convenience of facilities based on user intentions and the capacity of parking lots. A method to quantitatively evaluate Michi-no-Eki facilities that are assumed to be accessed by various modes of transportation as transportation hubs has proposed by this research.

In the future, a mixed pedestrian-vehicle traffic flow simulation environment in a shared space where pedestrians and vehicles are mixed is necessary, but it is difficult to observe the simulation input in a limited environment such as a roadside station. However, the detection accuracy of pedestrians and bicycles is low, and there are issues to be solved in order to perform constant observation. Among them, there is a particular problem in the detection accuracy of pedestrians and bicycles, so in this research, network cameras were installed at 10 locations in Nagoya University campus and pedestrians and bicycles were observed for one month. Then, we constructed a people flow counting system using YOLO and Strong Sort, which detect in real time from the observed images. In order to improve the accuracy of the counting results, we were able to greatly improve the accuracy of pedestrian measurement by constructing an algorithm that can be applied to the whole rather than taking measures for each measurement area. Based on the analysis and results of the above, we will verify the possibility of applying it to continuous observation in the city.

Railway operators are endeavoring to improve the people's perception of their services in order to gain more residents nearby. However, there are no studies focusing on the relationship between perception of railway services and residential location preference in urban areas. In this study, a questionnaire survey on urban railways was conducted. We applied factor analysis to the collected data, and aspects of the perception were integrated into four categories. Next, we developed a regression model to reveal the relationship between categories of perception aspects and residential location preference. The model suggests quantitative and specific perception of urban railway services that have a residential location preference.

In mountainous areas, there is an increasing need for residents to engage in new forms of mutual assistance activities to support local life. However, the implementation of these activities heavily relies on the residents' motivation for cooperation, meaning they cannot be initiated immediately. This study investigates the impact of individual characteristics on residents' motivation for cooperation. Additionally, it focuses on strategic initiatives designed to maintain the community as a key factor in enhancing this motivation. The aim is to understand how much these initiatives can boost the motivation for participating in mutual assistance activities.

In recent years, to understand the liveliness of cities in the midst of lifestyle changes and diversification, it is necessary to take into account not only static characteristics of cities such as the number of facilities and population, but also dynamic characteristics such as the diversity and fluidity of visitors from multiple perspectives. Therefore, in this study, using mobile spatial statistics, which are data that can be continuously observed and attributes such as gender and age are available, we calculated a liveliness index by applying the diversity and agglomeration of attributes for each mesh to the crowd prosperity index. This index was calculated as an indicator of urban diversity, and the variation was confirmed by applying the proposed index to the period when behavior changed significantly due to the Corona Disaster, revealing differences by mesh. In addition, we analyzed the relationship between the urban functions and economic potential of each mesh and clarified the significance of using the index as an indicator of urban vitality based on its correlation with the proposed liveliness index.

In recent years, many attempts have been made to use vehicle probe data to evaluate locational crash risk. However, there has not been sufficient theoretical discussion of the effect of using probe data on improving the accuracy of locational crash risk evaluation. In this study, at first, a theoretical model for evaluating the risk of head on crashes were developed. Next, crash data and probe data information (the number of trips and the number of sudden decelerations) at each intersection were generated by stochastic trials, and then compared the calculated theoretical crash risk with the estimated crash risk based on each of the generated data. In addition, a sensitivity analysis was conducted to examine the relativity between the theoretical frequency of crashes and the frequency of sudden deceleration. The results suggested that the effect of using the frequency of sudden decelerations from probe data may be not apparent depending on the probe vehicle penetration rate, and that there was a possibility of overestimating crash risks at safe intersections by using the frequency of sudden deceleration.

In recent years, shared cycle services have expanded in many countries, including Japan. Understanding the needs of users is essential for the future development of shared-cycle services and for improving their usage. On the other hand, it is difficult to collect user needs in Japan, where there are many unmanned shared-cycle services. In this study, we constructed a model to estimate the purpose of use by combining actual use data, questionnaire data, and building area data around ports, and applying machine learning models, Random Forest Model and XGBoost Model, to the model. The results of interpreting each model using the SHAP indicator indicated that travel distance and travel start time were important explanatory variables in determining the purpose of use. In addition, we applied the models to the actual usage data for multiple years to understand changes in user behavior.

This paper discusses the long-term impact of COVID-19 pandemic on inbound tourism from China aiming to investigate the prospect in the post-pandemic. First we review trends concerning COVID-19 impact studies at home and abroad and then introduce the empirical results from two cross-sections WEB-based data in 2020 and 2022 to explore how the pandemics have had various impact on not only changes in daily activity and travel patterns, those in attitude toward the risk with the pandemic, but also those in intention of visiting Japan in the post-pandemic. Besides, the challenges that we should verify for evidence to support inbound tourism restoration policies are finally summarized.

The purpose of this study is to analyze spatio-temporal changes in population flow under COVID-19 using mobile spatial statistics which are population statistics based on mobile phone location information in the Tokyo metropolitan area. Concretely, the characteristics of time-series changes in inflow and outflow of population in each municipality were analyzed based on the population data of residences and places of stay in mobile spatial statistics. As a result, it was shown that the decrease in inflow and outflow of population was large under the issuance of the state of emergency declaration, and that outflow of population decreased significantly in Tokyo 23 wards and surrounding areas and decreased in suburban areas. In addition, it was shown that inflow of population decreased greatly in the Tokyo 23 wards, Tama area and the eastern part of Kanagawa prefecture. Furthermore, the relationship between changes in inflow and outflow of population and the industrial population was analyzed. As a result, it was shown that the information and communication industry had a significant impact on the increase and decrease of inflow and outflow of population.

As natural disasters become more severe and frequent, implementation of disaster countermeasures aimed at maintaining and improving the stability and sustainability of railway freight transportation, which plays an important role in Japan's logistics, is meaningful not only for the freight railway business but also for society. On the other hand, it is costly in terms of budget and time to implement. Therefore, in order to implement disaster countermeasures that are beneficial to all concerned parties, it is necessary to evaluate their effectiveness from various perspectives. In this study, we constructed a method that can quantitatively evaluate the effectiveness of implementing disaster countermeasures, using the benefits and burdens on freight railway operators, which have not been considered in previous studies, as indicators. As a case study using the method, we evaluated the effectiveness of strengthening alternative truck transportation among major freight stations in various parts of Japan. The results show how various countermeasures differ in effectiveness considering costs on freight railway operators.

To achieve sustainable transportation in urban area, collaboration between multiple stakeholders such as municipalities and companies become of increasing importance. In this research, as a case study of area management approach aiming for transportation demand control, we propose a practical big data analysis method of arrival time distribution at work place area using smartphone location data with user-ID. The objective is to encourage consensus building between multiple stakeholders without large cost and time. Our method enables to visualize distribution of arrival time at any work place area while taking into account frequency of visits by individual. We assess the accuracy and effectiveness of the proposed method using actual attendance records given by the large manufacturing plants in Kumamoto Semicon Techno Park Area, where it is concerned that traffic congestion get much worse because a new large plant is expected to open in 2024. The analysis results were presented to the regional transportation councils in Kumamoto-ken to create opportunities for discussion about staggered working hours from the viewpoint of area management.

A new function of “Michi-no-Eki” as “transportation hubs” that connect various modes of transportations has been proposed. The authors have developed a method to quantitatively evaluate the “facility available” of a Michi-no-Eki as a transportation hub based on users' intentions, but the impact of the improvement of facility available on user behavior such as transportation hub selection has not yet been clarified. In this study, the improvement of facility available was defined as a factor that increases utility in route selection, and analyzed the relationship with monetary and time cost based on a questionnaire survey of users. In the results that all methods applied to real network, some Michi-no-Eki with high facility available may be selected as transportation hubs.

Most studies on the impact of the road network structure on performance assume regular networks such as lattice or radial networks, or networks with known degree distributions and assortativity, etc., which do not adequately represent the actual urban road network. Therefore, this study proposes a general road net-work generation model that takes into account the characteristics of real urban road networks. Using road network data from 141 cities in Japan, clustering by network structure indices was performed, and a road network generation model was constructed using the optimal number of nodes and links for each cluster as input parameters. Furthermore, a method for hierarchising the generated road network was proposed, and by verifying the properties of the generated road network based on the travel time distribution between pairs of locations, it was confirmed that making the top-ranked roads ring-shaped and reducing the proportion of road extension on the low-ranked roads lead to improved transport functions.

In Japan, the stock effect of social infrastructure development is traditionally measured in terms of user benefits defined in the Cost-Benefit Analysis Manual. However, recent studies have adopted the Spatial Computable General Equilibrium (SCGE) model to analyze the distribution of these effects. Unlike most approaches that assume a perfectly competitive market, the UK Department for Transport employs the Wider Economic Impacts (WEIs) framework, which considers an imperfectly competitive market and captures additional effects beyond conventional cost-benefit analysis. In this study, we specifically focus on agglomeration benefits among the various benefits encompassed by the WEI framework. To investigate the impact of market competition assumptions on benefits, we develop two models: one utilizing the SCGE model assuming perfect competition and the other incorporating monopolistic competition. By comparing the benefits calculated by each model, we examine the extent to which assumptions like increasing returns and diversity preference influence the benefits derived from reduced transportation costs. Our findings reveal that these assumptions account for approximately 20-30% of the benefits measured in a perfectly competitive market.

In recent years, AI-based image analysis methods have been introduced in automobile traffic volume measurement, establishing a system for automatic observation. However, the measurement accuracy for bicycles and pedestrians remains low, prompting high expectations for the development of multi-purpose traffic measurement AI capable of acquiring not only traffic volume but also movement speed, movement trajectory, and other information. This study aims to develop a multi-purpose traffic measurement AI that can estimate traffic volume and vehicle speed for bicycles and pedestrians. Specifically, we trained a convolutional neural network (CNN) using new training labels and leveraged information obtained from object tracking to facilitate traffic volume and speed estimation. Additionally, we proposed a self-learning method for each location to address differences in measurement accuracy among locations, and validated the efficacy of learning synthetic images using the background images of the observation locations.

The edge line marking indicates the outer edge of the roadway as well as the roadside strip which is a walking space. The purpose of this study is to clarify how the implementation is decided, and to grasp its characteristics as a traffic safety measure for pedestrians. First, we reviewed the relevant regulations on the “Road Structure Ordinance” and “Road Traffic Act”. Then we recognized that the edge line marking has two different aspects: “to effect to a roadway” and “to create pedestrian space”. Next, we conducted interview surveys and questionnaire surveys with road administrators to obtain data such as the process of judgment in the implementation of countermeasures, the judgment factors to be considered, their selection trends and weighting, the implementation status of countermeasures, etc. As a result of the consideration, we found that the roadway edge marking is a method that is easy to obtain a decision to implement, but the implementation as a pedestrian safety measure requires a motivation as to protect pedestrians due to its two-sidedness.

In this study, based on a questionnaire survey of elderly people in Toyota City, we examined the willingness to purchase the free-ride policy for railroads, buses, and cabs, as well as the increase in the frequency of going out and the expansion of the range of going out that would result from the use of the policy. The results showed that even if public transportation became free and unlimited, there were people who did not use it and those who went out and talked with others less frequently. This suggests that many people who currently use private cars will decrease their activity if they cannot successfully switch from private cars to public transportation. Attributes that were likely to purchase an unlimited public transportation plan were: relatively young elderly, elderly living alone, elderly-only households, elderly with long distances to bus stops, elderly with long distances to train stations, elderly with short walking distances, and users of buses, trains, and cabs. The development of measures needs to target these groups.

Focusing on the fact that electricity consumption strongly reflects the level of activity of residents and businesses, we attempted to analyze the impact of flood damage using smart meter data that can be obtained on a small spatial scale and in real-time. Specifically, we compared multiple data analysis methods for forecasting electricity demand and estimated the amount of decrease in electricity consumption due to flooding by the best method in terms of forecasting errors. As a result of applying this analysis approach to the areas affected by the heavy rainfall in 2019, the various recovery patterns of electricity consumption are obtained both in inundated and non-inundated areas. These results suggest that the use of smart meters may lead to a spatially and temporally precise understanding of flood damage.