Researching Transit

This is the seventh episode in Researching Transit's Handbook of Public Transport Research Series. Links to the book can be found at the end of the notes.

In this episode, Professor Graham Currie speaks to Kari E. Watkins, Frederick Law Olmsted Associate Professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech). She is also the lead author of Chapter 21 of the Handbook of Public Transport Research: Advances in transit customer information.

Associate Professor Watkins is the director of the T-SCORE (Transit-Serving Communities Optimally, Responsible, and Efficiently) Center, a US DOT-funded program that brings together several universities to conduct research into the future of transit. T-SCORE’s mission is to understand ridership trends and the underlying drivers of change, and identify ways to position transit as a robust part of any future transportation system. An early contribution of the program is the development of future transportation scenarios, based on expert interviews.

Prior to her current role at Georgia Tech, Watkins completed a PhD at the University of Washington in Seattle. During her PhD she co-developed the real-time transit app One-Bus-Away. The app was among the first to harness smartphones and real-time transit information technologies, capable of providing users with up-to-date transit vehicle location data.

Watkins continues to undertake research in transit customer information. Such information is critical, she says, for facilitating transit use by giving potential users the information they need to plan their journeys on transit when other alternatives are available. As its title suggests, Chapter 21 of the Handbook reviews the technologies, standards and apps making data about transit more readily available for both customers and planners. Three advances are focal points: the opening up of GTFS, the widespread adoption of smartphones, and data standardisation. Together, this has led to the emergence of reusable smart-phone integrated applications that can be readily adapted for new agencies/systems. Data standardisation has been key to disseminating information for agencies that might not have in-house resources to provide their information otherwise.

The Chapter concludes with a look to the future and potentials of open and standardised transit data, including efficient microtransit and adaptation to other modes of transportation such as bikeshare, that often interface with public transport.

Find out more about Kari E. Watkins and her work:

https://ce.gatech.edu/people/faculty/5861/overview

T-SCORE Center: http://tscore.ce.gatech.edu/

One-Bus-Away: https://onebusaway.org/

Find out more about the Handbook of Public Transport Research, and Kari's chapter here: https://www.e-elgar.com/shop/gbp/handbook-of-public-transport-research-9781788978651.html.

Have feedback? Find us on twitter and Instagram @transitpodcast or using #researchingtransit

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This is the fourth episode in the Researching Transit Handbook of Public Transport Research series. Links to obtain the book can be found at the end of the notes.

In this episode, Professor Graham Curries speaks to Professor Ahmed El-Geneidy. El-Geneidy is professor of transport planning at McGill University, and one of the co-authors of Chapter 4 of the Handbook: Transit customer satisfaction research: Is the customer always right?.

Professor El-Geneidy has a prolific publication record that spans transport and land use, cycling and public transport. He explains how mentors have helped him develop the ability to ask the right questions, work efficiently, and collaborate with others. In turn, El-Geneidy explains how he approaches his role as a mentor to research students at the Transportation Research at McGill (TRAM) group, which he leads.

El-Geneidy discusses some of the forces that are amplifying the impact and reach of public transport research. Two of these are collaboration and data. Recently, researchers around the world pooled their insights about transportation access, including public transport systems, to benchmark accessibility around the world. A paper documenting this research was recently published in Nature’s Urban Sustainability journal.

The other force they discuss is data. Not only is more public transport data being created, but the methods available for harnessing this data are improving. In Chapter 4 of the Handbook, El-Geneidy and his co-authors Madalena Harreman-Fernandes, Ehab Diab, Boer Cui, James DeWeese, Miles Crumley explore insights about customer satisfaction on buses, using complaints data. Taking a customer-focused approach, the researchers examined complaints made by users of Portland’s Tri-Met bus network. Complaints were classified into themes including customer satisfaction with service quality and critical incidents. The researchers cross-referenced this information with operational data to explore causes and validate complaints. For example, pass-by incidents could be matched with time-stamped operational data and occupancy to identify instances where overcrowding may have prompted stop skipping as the source of pass-by complaints. Such information provides useful insight for operators about the actual causes of customer dissatisfaction. El-Geneidy notes that the potential of data to be put to use in transport planning is only beginning to be realised. New methods of extracting and cleaning the data are key to tapping into its full potential.

Find out more about today’s show in Chapter 4 of the Handbook of Public Transport Research - Transit Customer satisfaction research: Is the customer always right? The Handbook is available for purchase from the publisher’s website: https://www.e-elgar.com/shop/gbp/handbook-of-public-transport-research-9781788978651.html.

Learn more about Professor El Geneidy and Transportation Research at McGill (TRAM)

https://www.mcgill.ca/urbanplanning/people-0/el-geneidy

http://tram.mcgill.ca/index.html

Read about access around the world in the recently published academic paper:

Wu, H., Avner, P., Boisjoly, G., Braga, C.K.V., El-Geneidy, A., Huang, J., Kerzhner, T., Murphy, B., Niedzielski, M.A., Pereira, R.H.M., Pritchard, J.P., Stewart, A., Wang, J., Levinson, D., 2021. Urban access across the globe: an international comparison of different transport modes. npj Urban Sustainability 1, 16. https://doi.org/10.1038/s42949-021-00020-2

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This is the fifth episode in the Researching Transit Handbook of Public Transport Research series. Links to the book can be found at the end of the notes.

In this episode, Professor Graham Currie speaks to Margareta Friman and Maria Borjesson, two of the authors of Chapter 20 of the Handbook: Large increases in bus use in Sweden: lessons learned. Margareta Friman works at Karlstad University where she is Pro-vice Chancellor, as well as Professor of Psychology and member of the Service and Market Oriented Transport (SAMOT) Research Group. Maria Borjesson is Professor of Economics and a researcher at VTI – The Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute and Likoping University.

Professor Friman talks about the three areas of focus for public transport research at SAMOT: travel behaviour, travel experiences, and perceived accessibility. One of SAMOT’s strengths is pairing psychology and business perspectives to provide insights about the motivations for public transport mode shift. Their research has also elevated the role of the user, not just gaining insights about their travel experiences, but also giving a user focus to contracting and service design. Their perceived accessibility research aims to understand the extent to which users feel they can undertake the travel they want. SAMOT’s ongoing passenger experience research unveiled a shift in the relative importance of ‘stress’ during COVID-19, with its relative importance increasing.

Professor Friman is joined by Professor Maria Borjesson to discuss the lessons learned from Sweden’s major bus network expansion, the focus of Chapter 20 of the Handbook. In recent years, Sweden enjoyed a 50% increase in bus use. How did they achieve this? The country increased the supply of bus services dramatically. Yet despite this expansion, operating costs increased per unit of travel. They attribute this to the bespoke, and not necessarily supply-driven, nature of the revamped network. Increased operating costs have driven up the ticket price of transport dramatically, which has in turn created an equity issue for pre-existing users of public transport. Finally, Sweden has not seen a reduction in car use. This demonstrates the need to understand if bus use can really reduce car travel; a major motivation for Sweden’s investment in the bus network.

Find out more about this research in Chapter 20 of the Handbook of Public Transport Research, co-authored by today’s guests as well as Masoud Fadei, available for purchase from the publisher’s website: https://www.e-elgar.com/shop/gbp/handbook-of-public-transport-research-9781788978651.html.

Learn more about the people and projects in today’s show:

Professor Margareta Friman https://www.kau.se/en/researchers/margareta-friman

Service and Market Oriented Transport (SAMOT) Research Group - https://www.kau.se/en/ctf/research/ctf-research/research-projects/samot-service-and-market-oriented-transport-research

Professor Maria Borjesson: https://www.vti.se/en/employees/maria-bratt-borjesson

VTI; Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute: https://www.vti.se/en

Have feedback? Find us on twitter and instagram @transitpodcast or using #researchingtransit

Music from this episode is from https://www.purple-planet.com/

This is the fourth episode in the Researching Transit Handbook of Public Transport Research series. Links to obtain the book can be found at the end of the notes.

In this episode, Professor Graham Currie speaks to the author of Chapter 9, The Total Social Cost (TSC) of Public Transport Modes, Professor John Preston. John Preston is Professor of Rail Transport in the Transportation Research Group at the University of Southampton.

Professor Preston talks about his pathway into rail transit research, noting the shifting focus particularly in the realm of transit demand forecasting. He notes the move away from probabilistic demand models, suggesting future research will need to deliver more nuanced understanding of the drivers of transit ridership. Professor Preston discusses some of the projects his research group and collaborators have delivered, including station-level demand prediction tools, and an ongoing project to develop Mobility as a Service tools.

Professor Preston then elaborates the concept of Total Social Cost (TSC) models of public transport, the focus of his Chapter in the Handbook of Public Transport Research. TSC comprises three elements: operator costs, user costs and external costs. As well as considering operator costs, the TSC approach to modelling transit alternatives considers their ease of use (user cost) and their impact on such external factors as congestion, emissions and safety (external costs). Considering all three can help agencies and governments choose more appropriate transit technologies. The book chapter contains more detail concerning the economic appraisal of each aspect along with case studies from Vietnam (1) and China (used to evaluate the famous straddling bus concept (2) among others) about the economic costing of each aspect.

Find out more about this research in Chapter 9 of the Handbook of Public Transport Research, available for purchase from the publisher’s website: https://www.e-elgar.com/shop/gbp/handbook-of-public-transport-research-9781788978651.html

Learn more about Professor Preston and the concepts in today’s show:

https://www.southampton.ac.uk/engineering/about/staff/jpreston.page

Transportation Research Group, University of Southampton: https://www.southampton.ac.uk/engineering/research/groups/transportation_group.page

Example of a Total Social Cost Alternative Transit Mode Analysis in Vietnam http://publictransportresearchgroup.info/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Figure-1-Example-Total-Social-Cost-Alternative-Transit-Mode-Analysis-in-Vietnam-Source-Vu-and-Preston-2020.jpg

(1) Tam Vu & John Preston (2020) Assessing the social costs of urban transport infrastructure options in low and middle income countries, Transportation Planning and Technology, 43:4, 365-384, DOI: 10.1080/03081060.2020.1747202

(2) An example of the straddle bus concept: http://images.china.cn/attachement/jpg/site1007/20100906/000bcdb95f1d0deeddd41e.jpg

This is the third episode in the Researching Transit Handbook of Public Transport Research series. Links to obtain the book can be found at the end of the notes.

In this episode, Professor Graham Curries speaks to authors of Chapter 19, Incorporating Mobility on Demand (MOD) and Mobility as a Service (MaaS) automotive services into Public Transportation, Emma Lucken and Susan Shaheen. Susan Shaheen is Professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering at UC Berkeley. She is also Co-director, Transportation Sustainability Research Center (TSRC), UC Berkeley, and chair of the US Transportation Research Board Executive committee. Emma Lucken is undertaking a PhD in transportation engineering and is also a member of TSRC.

Professor Shaheen reflects on the motivation and philosophy that has underpinned her research career in transportation. She has always sought to challenge the status quo, using technology to provide sustainable mobility options that could be superior to private automobile ownership and use, particularly from an environmental and social perspective. Public transport, paired with other mobility options, is central to providing mobility without the need for car ownership.

Turning attention to the book chapter, Shaheen makes the distinction between Mobility on Demand (MOD) and Mobility as a Service (MaaS). Mobility on demand refers to an ecosystem of transport options that offer integrated and seamless access. Transportation network companies (TNCs, or ridesharing services as they are more commonly known in Australia), as well as microtransit and public transportation, make up links in this ecosystem. Mobility as a Service refers to the provision of on-demand mobility through apps and subscriptions. Emma Lucken describes the different service models of some of the 62 TNC and microtransit projects identified in the USA. Four main models emerge, which can be described by the ways in which the public-private partnerships seek to supplement fixed-route transit. These include: first- and last-mile services, low-density services, off-peak services and paratransit services for users who may not be able to use fixed route services as readily or who may not be able to harness the technology that often accompanies Mobility on Demand.

Find out more about this research in Chapter 19 of the Handbook of Public Transport Research, available for purchase from the publisher’s website: www.e-elgar.com/shop/gbp/handbook…781788978651.html

Learn more about the people and projects in today’s show:

Prof Susan Shaheen: https://ce.berkeley.edu/people/faculty/shaheen

Emma Lucken: https://tsrc.berkeley.edu/emma-lucken

Transportation Sustainability Research Centre: https://tsrc.berkeley.edu/

Innovative Mobility Research (Susan’s lab): http://innovativemobility.org/

If you enjoyed this episode, you may also enjoy episode 12 with Dr Taru Jain , on the role of carshare in the mobility ecosystem http://publictransportresearchgroup.info/?p=51729.

Have feedback? Find us on twitter and instagram @transitpodcast or using #researchingtransit

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This is the second episode in the Researching Transit Handbook of Public Transport Research series. Links to obtain the book can be found at the end of the notes. In this episode, Professor Graham Currie speaks to another of the book’s authors, Associate Professor Oded Cats. Dr Cats cofounded and co-directs the Smart Public Transport Lab, in the Department of Transport Planning, at TU Delft.

Two key areas of focus for the Smart PT Lab are network resilience (the focus of Chapter 12 in the Handbook), as well as changing public transport usage patterns. This includes charting the interaction of public transport with other travel modes, including the role of the bicycle in rail journeys, as well as emerging mobility technologies. The Critical MaaS project with the Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Metropolitan Solutions (AMS Institute) explored the role of public transport on demand in the future mobility ecosystem.

Chapter 12 of the Handbook of Public Transport Research focuses network resilience. The chapter, Public Transport Network Resilience, was written by Dr Menno Yap and. Dr Cats. During the interview, Dr. Cats discusses some of the indicators and strategies that can be used to model the impact of unexpected events. He discusses the special case of the black swan event, the event that can’t be planned for because it has not been experienced before. He emphasises the need to strike an effective balance between efficiency and network resilience.

Taking a passenger experience focus has been a hallmark of projects and research into network reliability. The use of smartcard data has been central to these efforts. In a recent example of collaboration across academia and industry, the Smart PT Lab for the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) to understand and address trip-level delays experienced by individual passengers. The Smart PT Lab’s research was central to implementing a scheme aimed at improving the passenger experience, by providing refunds for trips that were delayed more than 15 minutes. The success of the scheme has resulted in the delay window being reduced to 10 minutes.

The Handbook of Public Transport Research is available for purchase from the publisher’s website: https://www.e-elgar.com/shop/gbp/handbook-of-public-transport-research-9781788978651.html

Learn more about the people and projects in today’s show:

Smart Public Transport Lab: http://smartptlab.tudelft.nl/

Oded Cats: https://odedcats.weblog.tudelft.nl/

Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Metropolitan Solutions (AMS): https://www.tudelft.nl/bk/samenwerken/amsterdam-institute-for-advanced-metropolitan-solutions

Read lessons learned from the WMATA project, undertake by Dr. Menno Yap and Dr. Oded Cats.

Yap, M.D., Cats, O., 2020. Predicting disruptions and their passenger delay impacts for public transport stops. Transportation (Dordrecht). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11116-020-10109-9

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Professor Graham Currie introduces a new book that is hot off the press: The Handbook of Public Transport Research. The book, edited by Professor Currie, is the most recent in the Research Handbooks in Transport Studies series, published by Edward Elgar. It brings together the latest research from 52 authors across 10 countries, packed into 21 chapters.

In this episode of the podcast, Graham provides an in-depth preview of the book. The aim of the book is to guide readers through the emerging challenges and opportunities for public transport posed by urbanisation and the growth of mega-cities.

The book weaves together expert knowledge and research at the intersection of public transport and a diverse array of disciplines. These include industrial designing, optimisation, economics and land-use planning. It is organised into five sections, which enable practitioners and researchers to dive into the perspective that is relevant for them. These are:

- Research Foundations

- User Perspectives

- Policy Perspectives

- Planning and Operations Perspectives

- Service development and Future Perspectives

We take a deeper look at Chapter Two - State of the Art of Public Transport Research. This Chapter, co-authored by Dr Nicholas Fournier (UC Berkeley) and Graham, provides an interesting overview of the geographic trends and topic strengths and weaknesses in public transport research.

This episode is the first in a series that will cover a chapter of the handbook in depth through conversations with the authors.

Download the book from Edward Elgar publishing

https://www.e-elgar.com/shop/gbp/handbook-of-public-transport-research-9781788978651.html

You can stay up to date with public transport innovations via World Transit Research, the database used by authors Nicholas Fournier and Professor Currie to compile Public Transport: State of the Art, for this book. Subscribe: www.worldtransitresearch.info.

Have feedback? We’re listening. Please send your comments to [email protected] us on twitter and instagram @transitpodcast or using #researchingtransit.

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Dr Alexa Delbosc is a Senior Lecturer at the Institute of Transport Studies at Monash University. With a PhD in civil engineering and a Masters in social psychology, Dr Delbosc’s expertise is geared toward understanding the psychology of transport use. In today’s show, she speaks with Professor Graham Currie about the psychology of public transport use.

Dr Delbosc first discusses the public transport habits of millennials, including how COVID-19 has affected their life plans and mobility. She also delves into a new and novel research topic: that of mindfulness and mobility. Dr Delbosc discusses the unique opportunity public transport presents to ‘send the mind away’, and how this affects their experience of travelling.

Read more about Alexa and her latest research on the topics discussed during today’s show:

https://research.monash.edu/en/persons/alexa-delbosc

Who’s most affected on public transport in the time of coronavirus? https://theconversation.com/whos-most-affected-on-public-transport-in-the-time-of-coronavirus-133429

Millennials in cities: comparing travel behaviour trends across six case study regions, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cities.2019.01.023

Have feedback? We’re listening. Please send your comments to [email protected] us on twitter and instagram @transitpodcast or using #researchingtransit

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Dr Robbie Napper is an industrial designer who applies his skills to make public transport easier to use. Robbie works as a lecturer and researcher in the Monash University Department of Design, and is Deputy Director of the Mobility Design Lab, as well as a member of a number of TRB research committees.

Robbie is interested in making sure transit is fit for purpose. This means understanding the user, and asking ‘whose purpose’? He speaks about the design approach to developing better transit solutions, which involves testing an iterating over solutions, and designing them with subtle variations to meet the needs of different user groups.

Read more about Robbie and his work in the Mobility Design Lab:

• https://research.monash.edu/en/persons/robbie-napper

• https://www.monash.edu/mada/research/mobility-design-lab

Read about the Wheelie project: https://www.monash.edu/mada/research/the-wheelie

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Brendon Hemily is an independent public transport consultant based in Toronto, and Chair of the Public Transportation Group at Transportation Research Board (TRB). TRB brings together researchers, practitioners, government agency staff, and others, from all modes of transportation, to identify research needs, review current research, conduct research, and share and disseminate knowledge on transport research. It is the largest forum for transportation research in the world.

Speaking from experience in both research and practice, Brendon describes the challenges involved in ensuring academic research is pitched appropriately for use in the real world, and leads to innovation in practice. He also reflects on the drastic changes to both the running of TRB, including the move to a virtual conference in January of this year, and of research priorities generally in light of the pressures that the COVID-19 pandemic has placed on public transport operations.

You will find Brendon on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendon-hemily-45104210

Have feedback? We’re listening. Please send your comments to [email protected]. Find us on twitter and instagram @transitpodcast or using #researchingtransit

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