Grant: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
University of British Columbia
$3,949.00
Agent-based model for travel behaviour in multimodal networks - a modelling system for travelsmart initiatives
FY 2011-12
Summary
Urban sprawl has been observed in many urban areas across North America in recent years. It generally results in areas of medium to low densities and dispersed land use; such characteristics increase auto-dependency and lessen the potential of running an efficient transit system. In the Greater Vancouver Regional District (GVRD), more residents now live in the Green Belt (73%) with such land use characteristics, than in the City of Vancouver (27%) with its compact and dense urban form. With about 34.9% of the GVRD work trips destined to Vancouver, 13.3% of those are originated in the Green Belt with a 25.6% using transit. For travel activities generated from/destined to such areas, passengers transfer between different modes and different networks, forming what is called ""multimodal trips"". The topic of multimodal trip-making has been the topic of considerable attention in the public and media lately. Therefore, multimodal assignment models are increasingly becoming an essential component of any region-wide planning exercise. Existing research efforts have focused on auto trips and traffic operations, resulting in simplifying (or ignoring) the operations and performance of other modes of travel (such as transit or walking). For multimodal trips, this presents a major drawback since most multimodal trips include transit as the primary mode of travel. In fact, a large portion of multimodal trips do not include auto-usage for any part of the trip (e.g. walk-transit trips). In the GVRD, the percentage of trips using multimodal networks (e.g. walk/transit, bike/transit, auto/transit, etc) destined to Downtown Vancouver is about 50%. The focus of this research is to develop a modelling system to evaluate and assess a broad range of policies that support the integration of multimodal (public) transport networks and target TravelSmart initiatives. TravelSmart initiatives promote travel alternatives that are sustainable, healthy and reduce car use. This research proposes an innovative approach to investigate the modelling of passengers' travel choices in a multimodal network and the development of a multi-agent assignment framework for multimodal trips.
Program
Discovery Grants Program - Individual
Recipient
Location
British Columbia, Canada
Recipient Type
Academia
Type
Grant
Source
NSERC's Awards Data
As published
Application id
386503-2010
Name nom
Wahba, Mohamed
Department département
Civil Engineering
Organization id
2
Institution établissement
University of British Columbia
Province en
British Columbia
Province fr
Colombie-Britannique
Country en
CANADA
Country fr
CANADA
Fiscal year exercice financier
2011
Competition year année de concours
2010
Award amount
3949
Program id
RGPIN
Program nane en
Discovery Grants Program - Individual
Program name fr
Programme de subventions à la découverte - individuelles
Group en
Discovery grants programs
Group fr
Programmes de subventions à la découverte
Committee code
1509
Committee name en
Civil, Industrial and Systems Engineering
Committee name fr
Génie civil, industriel et des systèmes
Area of application code
700
Area of application group en
Transportation systems and services
Area of application group fr
Services et systèmes de transport
Area of application en
Transportation systems and services
Area of application fr
Services et systèmes de transport
Research subject code
1003
Research subject group en
Civil engineering
Research subject group fr
Génie civil
Research subject en
Transportation engineering
Research subject fr
Génie du transport
Partie
2
Nb partie
5
Application title
Agent-based model for travel behaviour in multimodal networks - a modelling system for travelsmart initiatives
Keyword
NSERC
Application summary
Urban sprawl has been observed in many urban areas across North America in recent years. It generally results in areas of medium to low densities and dispersed land use; such characteristics increase auto-dependency and lessen the potential of running an efficient transit system. In the Greater Vancouver Regional District (GVRD), more residents now live in the Green Belt (73%) with such land use characteristics, than in the City of Vancouver (27%) with its compact and dense urban form. With about 34.9% of the GVRD work trips destined to Vancouver, 13.3% of those are originated in the Green Belt with a 25.6% using transit. For travel activities generated from/destined to such areas, passengers transfer between different modes and different networks, forming what is called ""multimodal trips"". The topic of multimodal trip-making has been the topic of considerable attention in the public and media lately. Therefore, multimodal assignment models are increasingly becoming an essential component of any region-wide planning exercise. Existing research efforts have focused on auto trips and traffic operations, resulting in simplifying (or ignoring) the operations and performance of other modes of travel (such as transit or walking). For multimodal trips, this presents a major drawback since most multimodal trips include transit as the primary mode of travel. In fact, a large portion of multimodal trips do not include auto-usage for any part of the trip (e.g. walk-transit trips). In the GVRD, the percentage of trips using multimodal networks (e.g. walk/transit, bike/transit, auto/transit, etc) destined to Downtown Vancouver is about 50%. The focus of this research is to develop a modelling system to evaluate and assess a broad range of policies that support the integration of multimodal (public) transport networks and target TravelSmart initiatives. TravelSmart initiatives promote travel alternatives that are sustainable, healthy and reduce car use. This research proposes an innovative approach to investigate the modelling of passengers' travel choices in a multimodal network and the development of a multi-agent assignment framework for multimodal trips.
