Search

[Abstract] This study aimed to investigate the relationship between the characteristics of the areas of influence of bus stops and the decrease in ridership during COVID-19 lockdowns and subsequent initial reopening processes. A novel GIS methodology was developed to determine these characteristics from a large amount of data with high spatial detail and accurately assign them to individual bus stops. After processing the data, several multiple linear regression models were developed to determine the variables related to different activities and changes in mobility during lockdown that may explain the variation in demand owing to the COVID-19 pandemic. The characteristics related to population and land use were also studied. The proposed methodology can be used to improve transit planning during exceptional situations, by strengthening public transport in areas with a predictably higher transit demand, instead of uniformly decreasing the availability of public transport services, promoting sustainable mobility. The efficiency of the proposed methodology was shown by performing a case study that analysed the variation in bus demand in A Coruña, Spain. The areas with the highest sustained demand were those with low inhabitant incomes, a high population density, and significant proportions of land use dedicated to hospitals, offices, or supermarkets. Grant RTI2018–097924–B–I00 funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and by “ERDF A way of making Europe”. Grant PRE2019-089651 funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and by “ESF Investing in your future”

Colección: Contextos Universitarios Transformadores (CUT). Número 7 [Resumen] Este trabajo presenta la utilización de dos wikis diferentes, empleadas como herramientas de aprendizaje y evaluación en dos cursos (2019-2020 y 2021-2022) de la asignatura Movilidad Metropolitana y Terminales de Transporte, del Grado en Ingeniería de Obras Públicas, especialidad en Transportes y Servicios Urbanos. Mediante el desarrollo de wikis el estudiantado comparte la responsabilidad de generar conocimiento, lo que resulta motivador y da lugar a un aprendizaje más activo. Además, gracias a la interacción entre el estudiantado se consiguen resultados mejorados respecto a lo que se obtendría de manera individual. Mediante el diseño de estas actividades, la profesora de la asignatura y autora de este trabajo asegura la adquisición de competencias específicas de la materia, así como de algunas de las competencias transversales más relevantes para la práctica profesional. Por otra parte, se acerca al alumnado a la práctica profesional haciendo que se enfrente a problemáticas existentes en el mundo real relacionadas con la materia impartida en clase. [Abstract] This paper presents the utilization of two different wikis, used as learning and grading tools in two school years (2019-2020 and 2021-2022) in the course Metropolitan Mobility and Transport Terminals, from the Civil Engineering Degree, specialization in Transport and Urban Services. Through the development of wikis, students share the responsibility of building knowledge, which is motivating for them and results in a more active learning. In addition, improved results are attained through the interaction among students, in relation to those which would be achieved individually. Via the design of these activities, the lecturer of the course and author of this work ensures the acquisition of both specific competencies for the course and some of the more relevant transversal competencies for the professional practice. In addition, students are approached to their future professional activity making them face existing real-world problems related to the subject taught during lectures. http://hdl.handle.net/2183/32493

Financiado para publicación en acceso aberto: Universidade da Coruña/CISUG Erratum available online: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trb.2022.06.008 [Abstract] Residential location choice is a key component of the models for predicting land-use and transport demand in urban planning. In general, it requires to consider correlation between spatial alternatives. The approach of nested alternatives of the nested logit model has proved highly efficient in this context. This approach incorporates into the nested logit model both spatial and non-spatial correlations due to unobserved variables. The approach of metric extensions to the spatially correlated logit model specifies models for capturing spatial correlations between alternatives without having to design a nested structure. A model combining both approaches is proposed in this research. The spatially correlated nested logit model proposed herein models the correlation between alternatives of the nests of a nested logit model using a metric of spatial correlation between pairs of alternatives. The proposed model improves the properties of the nested logit model without the need of increasing the number of unknown parameters. Our model also improves the properties of a spatially correlated model with the same spatial metric. When needing to incorporate preference heterogeneity into the model, the proposed model is compatible with a mixed specification with random coefficients. The spatially correlated nested logit model was empirically applied to the real case of residential location choice in the city of Santander in Spain. In this empirical context, this model improved the explanatory and predictive power of the models that it combines. The authors acknowledge the financial support provided by the Government of Spain under the projects TRA2012–37659 and RTI2018–097924-B-I00, funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and by “ERDFA way of making Europe”. Funding for open access charge: Universidade da Coruña/CISUG https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trb.2022.06.008

[Abstract] Inclement weather conditions affect the behavior of travelers and transportation system operations. Understanding this influence can help improve operational planning schemes for any mode of transport, especially for buses. One of the factors that can be affected by rainfall is the time expended by a passenger from the moment a bus opens its doors until he/she boards the bus. This time is known as “boarding lost time” (BLT), and it was first introduced in the latest edition of the Transit Capacity and Quality of Service Manual (TCQSM). TCQSM only considers BLT for bus rapid transit (BRT) stations with more than one berth. Weather conditions are not considered when calculating the current BLT for a BRT system, given the provision of protective shelters over the entire boarding area of such stations. Furthermore, recommendations with regard to BLT for regular bus stops have not been provided. This paper presents analyses of BLT for a two-berth regular bus stop under different rainy conditions. The findings demonstrate that the increment in BLT between Berth 2 and Berth 1 under heavy rainfall is significantly higher than in the absence of rainfall. This study is part of the research project “Experimental analysis and modeling of the influence of stops, transfers, and right-of-way in bus systems,” reference RTI2018-097924-B-I00 MCIU/AEI/FEDER, UE.

[Abstract] Residential location choice (RLC) predicts where and how people choose their residential location in the framework of land use–transport interaction models (LUTI). This paper seeks an efficient RLC model in the context of irregular zoning of location alternatives. The main current proposals in the field are discrete choice models. In RLC modeling, the alternatives are spatial units, and spatially correlated logit (SCL) is an efficient approach when the analyst cannot pre-define groups of alternatives that efficiently reflect the systematic substitution patterns among the alternatives. The SCL uses the spatial information on the contiguity of the zones to determine spatial correlation among the alternatives. Urban residential location choice usually uses administrative zoning, which is very irregular in many cities (mainly historic cities); however, SCL is not efficient in this context owing to the limitations of the binary contiguity spatial variable employed as a spatial correlation metric (SCM). This paper proposes an extension of the mixed SCL model, with an SCM based on the proportion of common border length in contiguous zones, which is more efficient in the irregular urban zoning context. The proposed model is applied to an urban case study of LUTI RLC modeling with irregular zoning, based on the administrative divisions of the city of Santander (Spain) and is shown to be empirically more efficient than the previous approaches. The authors acknowledge the financial support provided by the Government of Spain under the projects TRA2012-37659 and RTI2018-097924-B-I00 MCIU/AEI/FEDER, UE

The European Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST) Action TU1103 “Operation and safety of tramways in interaction with public space” aimed at contributing to improve tramway safety through improving the management of data collection and the design of their insertion into urban space. The action has shown that across all the countries involved exists a great diversity of tramway systems and safety management mechanisms. Despite this diversity, the authors have been able to reach some conclusions about the nature of safety issues, the need for relevant information and the operator's essential role. This has enabled us to lay out some practical recommendations on accident data collection, indicators and their analysis. The authors have also observed a great variety regarding the urban insertion of tramway systems. Some countries pay special attention to protection, using barriers and fences as the general way of inserting the tramway. Other countries try to get a more integrated system, with an easier coexistence with pedestrians and cyclists in the city centre, but still guaranteeing the capacity and adequate speed of the tram when running through the metropolitan area. In any case, tramway systems deal with safety issues that are very similar in all countries, and the solutions and measures applied in some places can be useful for other networks facing similar problems or implementing a new line. This Project is funded by European Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST).

The COVID&ndash, 19 pandemic led to restrictions on activities and mobility in many parts of the world. After the main peak of the crisis, restrictions were gradually removed, returning to a new normal situation. This process has impacted urban mobility. The limited information on the new normal situation shows changes that can be permanent or reversible. The impact on the diverse urban transport modes varies. This study analyzes the changes in transit ridership by line, the use of stops, the main origin&ndash, destination flows, changes in transit supply, operation time, and reliability of the city bus network of A Coru&ntilde, a. It is based on data from automatic vehicle location, bus stop boarding, and smart card use. Data from the first half of 2020 were compared to similar data in 2017&ndash, 2019, defining suitable baselines for each analysis to avoid seasonal and day of week effects. The impact on transit ridership during the lockdown process was more significant than that on general traffic. In the new normal situation, the general traffic and the shared bike system recovered a higher percentage of their previous use than the bus system. These impacts are not uniform across the bus network.

Studies that link human behaviour to the influence of weather have historically been conducted in such fields as tourism, marketing and leisure. In most studies that jointly examine weather and the mode of transport, only open-air transportation has been considered (for example, bicycle, motorcycle or walking). This focus, together with the habitual use of data collected with automatic devices and a lack of studies that analyse this issue using stated preference data, are the main reasons motivating this paper. This paper aims to analyse the influence of weather and the density of traffic on the choice of transport mode. A case study is conducted in an access/egress corridor located in the city of Barcelona (Spain). Two data sources were used: revealed preference and stated preference data. Modelling techniques using mixed data enabled the stronger features from both data sources to be captured. Finally, we discuss how the selection of different alternative specific constants in models estimated using mixed data could generate unrealistic forecasting results if environmental changes are expected in the actual market.

This study identified and analyzed the reasons that have led the BusWay of Nantes, France, to be one of the most, if not the most outstanding and successful case of setting up a bus with high level of service (BHLS) system in European cities. The lessons and the conclusions from the study may be applicable to and useful for other sites with similar conditions. The analysis examined the measures that were implemented (infrastructure, vehicles, design of transit service operations, complementary facilities and services, and branding) and the results (level of service in frequencies and operating speed, reliability of schedules, ridership, and traffic safety). Furthermore, as BHLS and light rail transit (LRT) are integrated in the same level of the trunk network in Nantes, the city provided a relatively level playing field to develop an equitable comparison of the two systems. Through the case study of Nantes, the study found that the BHLS system was suitable for meeting demand volumes in the range from 1,000 to 2,500 passengers per hour in one of both directions during peak hours with a level and quality of service very near the LRT, but with more moderate investment costs and higher flexibility.

This paper provides a rough design tool kit to improve the safety of light rail transit (LRT) urban insertion. This tool kit was prepared after the analysis of more than 130 examples of good and bad practices related to LRT urban insertions in 13 European countries, which took place during the first working phase of the European Cooperation in Science and Technology's Action TU1103, Operation and Safety of Tramways in Interaction with Public Space. The paper deals with the design of the following aspects: pedestrian pathways at stations and stops; platform design and station and stop location; pavement treatment on shared space; pavement treatment on segregated channels; LRT separators on segregated channels; intersections (e.g., left-turn intersections, roundabouts, pedestrian and cyclist crossings, innovative solutions at intersections); LRT channel differentiation and protection by means of pavement, marks, fences, and barriers; and overhead contact system pole location.

TRAM Metropolitano de Alicante, a unique, metric (1,000 mm) gage system, was the first Spanish tram–train. Later, it lost its tram–train characteristic (i.e., railway tracks shared with conventional trains) as a result of the evolution of the railway network. Nevertheless, the system still operates in a quasi-tram–train way, because the tram–train vehicle runs partly on railway tracks with a railway signaling system and other railway equipment. This quasi-tram–train operation leads to some specific design issues that are explained in this paper. The paper also presents a thorough description of the Alicante network, its development, its construction and operational costs, its operation, and its demand.

Light rail systems are experiencing a revival in several countries. In many new and refurbished networks, turf—or grass—tracks are being used as a means to get a reserved right-of-way that entails enhancements in the city landscape. These tracks can facilitate acceptance of the system by citizens and politicians. The visual impact of turf tracks is only one of their many advantages, which are discussed in this paper. Among the advantages are a reduction in noise and suspended fine particles, the “green lung” effect, improvements in rainwater management and heat island mitigation, and a decrease in the operational and construction costs of the system. This solution has some inconveniences, such as the need for maintenance of vegetation and for rail–environment separation, and additional precautions must be taken to ensure good performance in the long term. There are also limitations, such as the inability of buses and emergency vehicles to travel on turf tracks; additional problems in case of derailment; and possible operational incidents due to irrigation, mowing, and the combination of vegetation waste and sand. This paper focuses on explaining the advantages, inconveniences, and limitations. The intent is to provide a better understanding of the solution and to simplify the decision of whether to use turf tracks in a new light rail system.

Turnouts are singular points of the railway track. In the past 20 years, a series of advances has added to their design as well as to the design of other elements of the track structure. These developments have allowed vehicles both to increase their running speed over the turnouts and to improve their reliability and security, and thus reduce maintenance costs. This paper focuses on geometric improvements in turnouts that permit high speeds over direct (350 km/h) and diverging (160 to 220 km/h) tracks. These improvements are related to diverging track alignments. The improvements include transition curves, switch rail design, and mechanization that have been adopted to avoid the straight switch rail strike phenomenon, and they include crossing modifications that avoid the existence of the gap.

Light rail systems are experiencing a revival in several countries in the world. Nevertheless, light rail systems are facing a more demanding market and by implication the need for continuous evolution and new technologies. An example of this need is related to the requirement of avoiding visual intrusion in some areas of cities that are more sensitive to visual impacts. This sensitivity has led to the implementation of new solutions that try to avoid the need for overhead contact wires throughout the whole network or throughout the distances between stations. These solutions are generally based on the use of new systems with an embedded third rail, onboard energy storage devices, or electrical energy produced on board the vehicle. This paper explains these technologies and their applicability, as well as their advantages, risks, and inconveniences, in an attempt to clarify the available options and their reliability.

Manuscrito aceptado para publicación (postprint) de: Novales, M., Orro, A., Bugarín, M. R. (2010). Track Geometry for Light Rail Systems. Transportation Research Record, 2146(1), 18–25. https://doi.org/10.3141/2146-03 [Abstract:] As it is known, light rail systems are characterized by their running over the streets, with semi-exclusive (or “reserved”) right of way. This fact leads to the necessity of adapting the track geometry to the one existing in the streets, which sometimes leads to great challenges: strong vertical grades, horizontal circular curves with very small radius without superelevation and transition curves, vertical curves with very small minimum radius, etc. Nevertheless, there are several good reasons for limiting track geometry parameters as far as possible due to their influence in vehicles design, in the efforts that the vehicle will transmit to the track (and, therefore, in maintenance work) and in operational and construction costs of light rail systems. In the paper, limitations for different track geometry parameters will be analyzed, comparing recommended maximum or minimum values of each parameter established by TRB (Transportation Research Board) and by UITP (International Union of Public Transport) and explaining interesting cases, sometimes outside those limits. The main reasons for each limitation will be exposed, either related to vehicle design, or passenger comfort, or any other physical condition. Finally, the first conclusions of a research which is being developed by the authors in relation to track geometry parameters and construction costs of light rail systems in Spain will be presented.

The provision of rural public transport has always been seen as a matter of competing for scarce public resources. The fundamental problem is that the demand for rural transport is low and the population is widely dispersed. Conventional public transportation solutions are not able to meet the demand efficiently. In this respect, railway transport proves to be particularly inefficient. In Spain there are approximately 2500 km of rural railway lines carrying low traffic volumes. These have traditionally been considered to be loss-making lines. Yet, in principle, this idea is incorrect. This paper looks at some of the techniques currently being successfully applied on rural railway lines that enable considerable savings on operational and maintenance costs to be made.

The tram-train concept consists of the operation of a light rail system that can run either on existing or new tramway tracks, or on existing railway tracks, so that the services of urban public transport can be extended towards the region over these existing railway tracks, with much lower costs than if a completely new line were built. The authors have developed a research project about the feasibility of such a system in Madrid (Spain), extending newly created light rail networks through local Renfe (National Railways) lines, or through the Metrosur line (a circular metro line of new construction in the south of the city). The aim of the paper is to explain the conclusions of this research project in relation to the main technical issues that must be solved to develop this system.

In response to the demand for improved mobility in metropolitan areas, the 1990s saw the development in Europe of a new transport system known as the tram-train. This system is based on the use of conventional railway lines with a low traffic density in order to extend urban tram or light rail services without the need to change vehicle, incorporating them into railway traffic. This allows for a wider range and scope of direct transport services and reduces waiting times and changes. The operation of light rail vehicles on conventional railway infrastructure involves finding solutions to a number of technical issues such as traction power supply system, rolling stock design, gauge, tyre and rail profile, structural strength, passenger access, signalling, etc. This paper describes these problems and the solutions arrived at by services currently in operation, or in advanced planning stages, worldwide.

In response to the demand for improved mobility in metropolitan areas, the 1990s saw the development of a new transport system in Europe known as the tram-train. This system is based on using conventional railway lines with a low traffic density to extend urban tram (streetcar) or light rail services without changing vehicles, incorporating them into railway traffic. The tram-train enables a wider range and scope of direct transport services and reduces waiting and transfer time. The operation of light rail vehicles on conventional railway infrastructure requires the solution of numerous technical issues, such as traction power supply system, rolling stock design, gage compatibility, tire and rail profile, structural strength, passenger access, and signaling. Such problems are described and their solution by services now operating, or in advanced planning stages, worldwide is discussed.

Medium-capacity transit systems (MCTS) cover the wide range existing between low-capacity systems (usually operating in streets with mixed traffic, with regular bus and tramways as the main solutions) and high-capacity systems (with exclusive right-of-way, as subway or suburban railways). MCTS are characterized by the use of a reserved right-of-way, which is longitudinally physically separated by curbs, barriers, grade separation and the like from other traffic, but with grade crossings for vehicles and pedestrians, including regular street intersections. The more common examples of MCTS are light rail transit (LRT) and bus with a high level of service (BHLS). Nowadays, BHLS has proven to be able to get the same performance as LRT in the most of the fundamental subjects, leading, in general, to lower capital costs. Nevertheless, there still is a certain tendency to think about LRT as a "better" system than BHLS. This tendency is based on the fact that BHLS is still associated to regular buses operation, and that people, even technicians, are not aware of the improvements in performance that can be achieved changing the operation philosophy of bus transit systems. In this paper, a comparison between LRT and BHLS will be made highlighting their main differences and similarities, and noting which of the assumed advantages of LRT are real and which others can be achieved by BHLS with a cared operation, taking the light rail concept to bus transit systems by the idea "think on LRT, give the service with buses".

To represent the behavior of travelers when they are deciding how they are going to get to their destination, discrete choice models, based on the random utility theory, have become one of the most widely used tools. The field in which these models were developed was halfway between econometrics and transport engineering, although the latter now constitutes one of their principal areas of application. In the transport field, they have mainly been applied to mode choice, but also to the selection of destination, route, and other important decisions such as the vehicle ownership. In usual practice, the most frequently employed discrete choice models implement a fixed coefficient utility function that is linear in the parameters. The principal aim of this paper is to present the viability of specifying utility functions with random coefficients that are nonlinear in the parameters, in applications of discrete choice models to transport. Nonlinear specifications in the parameters were present in discrete choice theory at its outset, although they have seldom been used in practice until recently. The specification of random coefficients, however, began with the probit and the hedonic models in the 1970s, and, after a period of apparent little practical interest, has burgeoned into a field of intense activity in recent years with the new generation of mixed logit models. In this communication, we present a Box‐Cox mixed logit model, original of the authors. It includes the estimation of the Box‐Cox exponents in addition to the parameters of the random coefficients distribution. Probability of choose an alternative is an integral that will be calculated by simulation. The estimation of the model is carried out by maximizing the simulated log‐likelihood of a sample of observed individual choices between alternatives. The differences between the predictions yielded by models that are inconsistent with real behavior have been studied with simulation experiments.