METRANS/ISE 650 Doctoral SEMINAR

THE IMPACT OF DIFFERENT ORGANIZATIONAL FORMS OF ROAD PUBLIC TRANSPORT ON DISTANCE COVERED AND ATMOSPHERIC POLLUTIONMarco DianaPost Doctoral Fellow
Institut National de Recherche sur les Transports et leur Sécurité (INRETS - The French National Institute for Transport and Safety Research)
Département Economie et Sociologie des Transports (DEST)ABSTRACTThe operation of public transport services that minimize emissions of pollutants plays a key role in improving air quality in urban areas. Considerable financial resources are employed to buy buses with innovative propulsive systems. However municipalities in poorer countries might not have sufficient funds to endow their fleets with such vehicles. We discuss the possibility of lowering distances traveled and associated emissions by changing the organizational form of the service. We consider a traditional bus service and a demand responsive service using buses or vans, and we identify the best system for every combination of demand and service quality with respect to travel and emissions minimization. The analysis is repeated for different urban patterns and street networks. Results indicate that the use of a demand responsive service can lower distances traveled when the demand is quite low, but that a good quality is required, provided that service requests are known in advance. Furthermore, the utilization of smaller vans with lower emission factors can deliver substantial benefits in terms of reducing atmospheric pollution, with an often negligible increase in kilometers traveled.BiosketchMarco Diana is a post doctoral fellow at INRETS, the French National Institute for Transport and Safety Research. He graduated in Civil Engineering at Turin Polytechnic (Italy), where he also took his Ph.D. in Transportation Engineering. He previously visited with USC's Epstein ISE Department for 7 months as a part of his Ph.D. research program. His research interests focus mainly on issues related to the ground implementation of unconventional public transportation modes, both on the supply (planning challenges) and on the demand side (users' behavioral reactions).

Location: Ralph And Goldy Lewis Hall (RGL) - - 308

Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

Contact: Shah Nirav