A seamless bus network without external transfers using autonomous modular vehicles

Authors

Zaid Saeed Khan
Mónica Menéndez

Document Type

Journal Article

Publication Date

2024

Subject Area

mode - bus, infrastructure - vehicle, planning - network design, planning - integration, operations - performance, operations - reliability, technology - intelligent transport systems, technology - automatic vehicle monitoring

Keywords

Autonomous modular buses, In-motion transfer, Stop-less bus, Transfer-less bus service, Bus network design

Abstract

Recently, autonomous modular vehicles (AMVs) capable of enabling in-motion transfer (IMT), i.e. passengers moving between vehicles while the vehicles are traveling, have been developed. IMT allows new paradigms for public transport operations that can enhance the speed, flexibility, and reliability of the system. We leverage IMT technology to propose the first network-wide seamless, stop-less bus service concept. We recently introduced the concept of a Stop-Less Autonomous Modular (SLAM) bus service, which eliminates the need for passengers to stop at each bus stop while traveling along a bus line. The current work extends this paradigm to the network level by developing a bus service framework in which multiple SLAM bus lines operating on main arterials interact by exchanging pods among each other to provide passengers with a travel experience that not only eliminates most extra passenger stops within a single line, but also eliminates external transfers, i.e. it removes the need to disembark at a bus stop to change buses when transferring from one bus line to another. The result is a high-speed service that provides a completely seamless journey from the passenger’s origin stop to destination stop anywhere in the coverage area, with integrated (i.e. internal) transfers that take place inside the vehicles themselves while they are in-motion. Our results show that while the proposed service has more stringent operating requirements than a comparable conventional bus service, it provides significantly superior performance, reducing passengers’ travel cost by up to 35% under realistic system settings.

Rights

Permission to publish the abstract has been given by Elsevier, copyright remains with them.

Comments

Transportation Research Part C Home Page:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/0968090X

Recommended Citation

Khan, Z. S., & Menéndez, M. (2024). A seamless bus network without external transfers using autonomous modular vehicles. Transportation Research Part C: Emerging Technologies, 168, 104822.