Abstract:

Aiming at the problems that appear in the demand response bus system including excessive detours, and difficulty in realizing the "door-to-door" service. A joint travel service combining demand-responsive connectors and shared bikes is proposed to relieve these problems. Utilizing a continuous approximation method, the discrete demand points and shared bicycle distribution points are transformed into continuous variables, and derive the calculation of transit operation costs, shared bicycle costs, and passenger travel time costs. With the goal of minimizing the total system cost, the coupling optimization of shared bicycles and demand-responsive buses is realized. Finally, the applicability of the proposed joint system is verified by taking the university city area in Chongqing as an example. The results show that the bike-fed DRC system can solve the problems that appeared in the operation. Besides that, compared with the DRC-only system, the joint travel mode can reduce the total system cost by up to 14.8%, the travel time saving by 15.2%, and the detouring saving of DRC vehicles by 29%, which can significantly improve the service efficiency and service level of public transportation.

Key words: urban traffic, joint optimization, continuous approximation, demand responsive connector, shared bikes