Ridership estimation for short-range transit planning

• Published in: Transportation research. Part B: methodological 1983-01, Vol.17 (3), p.233-244
• Main Authors: Nickesen, Alfred H., Meyburg, Arnim H., Turnquist, Mark A.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• ISSN: 0191-2615; 1879-2367
• DOI: 10.1016/0191-2615(83)90017-6

The objective of this research was to develop a simple transit ridership estimation model system for short-range planning. The main feature of the model system is that it exploits knowledge of transit link volumes which are obtained readily from on-off counts. Extensive use is made of default values for model parameters, taken directly from the transportation literature. The remaining parameters can be derived easily from generally available land-use and socioeconomic data. Expensive household surveys and time-consuming model calibrations are not required. A sequence of simple trip generation, trip distribution and modal split models generate trip-purpose specific transit trip tables, denoted as “trial” trip tables. These trip tables and observed transit link volumes are used in a linear programming model which serves as a correction mechanism. The gain in accuracy is achieved by using the ridership information contained in the transit link volumes. The corrected trip tables may be used in a pivot-point analysis to estimate changes in ridership and revenue. The results of a test application of the model system indicate that it can generate accurate ridership estimates when reliable transit link volumes are available from on-off counts, and when the trial transit trip tables as derived from the first three component models are reasonably accurate.