Exclusive Bus Lane Network Design: A Perspective from Intersection Operational Dynamics

Abstract

Exclusive bus lanes have demonstrated their effectiveness in increasing capacity and efficiency. However, when discussing the optimal design of exclusive bus lanes at the network level, existing studies predominantly focus on the interaction between transit and private vehicles at the links, while operational dynamics at the intersections and their impacts were insufficiently addressed. This paper contributes to developing a mathematical model for exclusive bus lane network design with operational dynamics at intersections explicitly captured. In the proposed model, lane re-configuration for transit and private vehicles at both road segments and intersections along with signal timing optimization are integrated in a unified framework. The model features a bi-level structure with the objective for reducing the total system person travel time. A genetic algorithm embedded with Emme is used for yielding solutions to the model. Results from both numerical and empirical tests demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed model and reveal that setting of exclusive bus lanes in the network without explicit consideration of intersection operational dynamics can significantly undermine the network performance with respect to both bus passengers and private vehicles.

A two-stage stochastic programming for the integrated emergency mobility facility allocation and road network design under uncertainty

“…With the integration of ITS, traffic managers can monitor traffic flow in specific areas and implement traffic restrictions in real-time (Papageorgiou et al, 2008), ensuring effective control to guarantee or reduce travel times. Particularly, in the backdrop of advanced technologies such as pre-scheduled travel and emergency (Zhao et al, 2019;Nguyen et al, 2021), EMFs and nearby disaster-affected individuals can benefit from the prioritized use of these express lanes. Additionally, by conducting periodic maintenance on road facilities, traffic managers can ensure unobstructed and efficient roadways (Papageorgiou et al, 2007), contributing to the overall guarantee or reduction of the travel times.…”

Integrated Robust Optimization of Scheduling and Signal Timing for Bus Rapid Transit

“…For intersection signal timing, three transit signal priority strategies are commonly adopted for the optimization of the BRT system, denoted as passive, active, and adaptive priority control. Passive TSP control performs an offline optimization procedure based on historical transit information [17,18]. In addition, the multi-objective optimization procedure was adopted for optimal results [19][20][21][22].…”

Optimal Multimodal Travelway Design for an Urban Street Network

“…For impacts assessment of EBL deployments, the primary objectives are to minimize total system cost [47], minimize networkwide total travel time [48]− [51], maximize consumer surplus and bus mode share [52], maximize network capacity utilization [53], minimize hourly variation of network total travel time with varying demand [54], and minimize network total travel time incorporating intersection delays [55]. Table 1 presents some notable studies on travelway design.…”