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Revisiting the destination ranking procedure in development of an Intervening Opportunities Model for public transit trip distribution

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Abstract

An Enhanced Intervening Opportunities Model (EIOM) is developed for Public Transit (PT). This is a distribution supply dependent model, with single constraints on trip production for work trips during morning peak hours (6:00 a.m.–9:00 a.m.) within the Island of Montreal, Canada. Different data sets, including the 2008 Origin–Destination (OD) survey of the Greater Montreal Area, the 2006 Census of Canada, GTFS network data, along with the geographical data of the study area, are used. EIOM is a nonlinear model composed of socio-demographics, PT supply data and work location attributes. An enhanced destination ranking procedure is used to calculate the number of spatially cumulative opportunities, the basic variable of EIOM. For comparison, a Basic Intervening Opportunities Model (BIOM) is developed by using the basic destination ranking procedure. The main difference between EIOM and BIOM is in the destination ranking procedure: EIOM considers the maximization of a utility function composed of PT Level Of Service and number of opportunities at the destination, along with the OD trip duration, whereas BIOM is based on a destination ranking derived only from OD trip durations. Analysis confirmed that EIOM is more accurate than BIOM. This study presents a new tool for PT analysts, planners and policy makers to study the potential changes in PT trip patterns due to changes in socio-demographic characteristics, PT supply, and other factors. Also it opens new opportunities for the development of more accurate PT demand models with new emergent data such as smart card validations.

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Acknowledgments

The authors acknowledge the support of Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) and the Agence Métropolitaine de Transport (AMT). We thank the survey consortium that provided the Greater Montreal Origin–Destination (OD) survey and the GTFS data. Special thanks to François Godefroy, Audrey Godin, Pierre-Léo Mongeon-Bourbonnais, Éric Poliquin, Hubert Verreault, and other members of the Mobilité chair at École Polytechnique de Montréal for their help in obtaining and preparing the different data sets.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Mathematics and Industrial Engineering, École Polytechnique de Montréal, Station Centre-Ville, C.P. 6079, Montreal, QC, H3C 3A7, Canada

    Mohsen Nazem & Martin Trépanier

  2. Department of Civil Engineering, École Polytechnique de Montréal, Station Centre-Ville, C.P. 6079, Montreal, QC, H3C 3A7, Canada

    Catherine Morency

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  1. Mohsen Nazem
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  2. Martin Trépanier
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  3. Catherine Morency
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Correspondence to Mohsen Nazem.

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Nazem, M., Trépanier, M. & Morency, C. Revisiting the destination ranking procedure in development of an Intervening Opportunities Model for public transit trip distribution. J Geogr Syst 17, 61–81 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10109-014-0203-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10109-014-0203-1

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