Study on behavioral impedance for route planning techniques from the pedestrian's perspective: some findings and considerations

The multi-disciplinary characteristics of transportation force a new design of geographic information systems, within which these characteristics are considered. In this context, geographic information systems for transportation are the result of the integration of transportation information systems and conventional geographic information systems. An interesting research area in geographic information systems for transportation is constraint management in route planning algorithms from the pedestrian s perspective. Constraint management becomes more complex when route planning takes into account an integrated public transportation network (i.e. a multimodal network). A study on the theoretical contextualization and taxonomy of a pedestrian s behavioral impedance has been developed in order to improve the constraint management from the pedestrian s perspective. This study entails strategies of travel reduction by private transport (e.g. travel by car) through switching to or substitution by alternative public transport (e.g. travel by walk, bus or rail). The grounded theory method has been used to develop the proposed taxonomy. Using the partial results of a questionnaire applied to a reduced group of people from Barcelona as a starting point, important data are being collected to define the mathematical model of the behavioral impedance domain. The goal of this paper is to provide some considerations about theoretical contextualization on identification and management of constraints regarding the behavioral impedance domain from the pedestrian s perspective within the urban public transportation context. The research project where this work is included is composed of six major phases. The first phase represents a continuous bibliographic review. The second phase was a study on sidewalks in the university zone of Barcelona. In this phase, an experimental application has been proposed and the management, map and route modules have been implemented on the ArcInfo GIS package and C++. This paper reports the partial work of the third phase, which is composed of two parts. The first part was a theoretical study on behavioral impedance for route planning techniques, in which taxonomy was proposed. The results of the second part are partially presented in this paper. The fourth (i.e. design and implementation), fifth (i.e. calibration and validation) and sixth (i.e. generalization of the results) phases are characterized by the application of the prototype regarding the multimodal network model for urban public transportation from the pedestrian s perspective. The main contribution of this article is the behavioral impedance taxonomy review from the pedestrian s perspective, which will allow designing a mathematical model and be used to implement a constraint management algorithm. Within this context, the proposed taxonomy could be used to model cost functions more precisely.Postprint (published version

Activity-based model development to support transport planning in the Stockholm region

The environment in which transportation analysis and infrastructure planning take place has changed dramatically during the last years. The focus is now, to a considerable extent, on how to transform the transportation system in a direction that could be sustainable in the long run, rather than on planning for infrastructure investment to meet new demand. At the same time information technology penetrates all sectors of the society. This will change how the transportation system will be used by travellers and conveyers, both directly, through new products and services, and, indirectly, through a spatial reorganisation of many activities that govern the transport demand. In such a situation it must be questioned whether the analytical tools that may have functioned reasonably well in the past, also are appropriate, or possible to adapt, to be useful for the issues we will face in the future. A survey is made of ideas for model development for travel analysis with an emphasis on activity based models based on an international literature review. The study treats tools for the whole chain from location decisions to network effects. The main focus is on such development that is of interest for a medium-sized city like Stockholm. It stresses demands that might be raised on modelling tools with a background in the planning issues that can expected to be central within the next ten-year period. Different ideas for model development, and existing models that could be considered for implementation, are evaluated with respect to their usefulness for planning, need for resources, demand for competence and data, and obstacles of implementation. Finally, we are suggesting some specific model development that should be tested in Stockholm, including a pilot study concerning the implementation of an activity-based model.

Context-awareness for mobile sensing: a survey and future directions

The evolution of smartphones together with increasing computational power have empowered developers to create innovative context-aware applications for recognizing user related social and cognitive activities in any situation and at any location. The existence and awareness of the context provides the capability of being conscious of physical environments or situations around mobile device users. This allows network services to respond proactively and intelligently based on such awareness. The key idea behind context-aware applications is to encourage users to collect, analyze and share local sensory knowledge in the purpose for a large scale community use by creating a smart network. The desired network is capable of making autonomous logical decisions to actuate environmental objects, and also assist individuals. However, many open challenges remain, which are mostly arisen due to the middleware services provided in mobile devices have limited resources in terms of power, memory and bandwidth. Thus, it becomes critically important to study how the drawbacks can be elaborated and resolved, and at the same time better understand the opportunities for the research community to contribute to the context-awareness. To this end, this paper surveys the literature over the period of 1991-2014 from the emerging concepts to applications of context-awareness in mobile platforms by providing up-to-date research and future research directions. Moreover, it points out the challenges faced in this regard and enlighten them by proposing possible solutions

Financial incentives to promote active travel: an evidence review and economic framework

ContextFinancial incentives, including taxes and subsidies, can be used to encourage behavior change. They are common in transport policy for tackling externalities associated with use of motor vehicles, and in public health for influencing alcohol consumption and smoking behaviors. Financial incentives also offer policymakers a compromise between “nudging,” which may be insufficient for changing habitual behavior, and regulations that restrict individual choice.Evidence acquisitionThe literature review identified studies published between January 1997 and January 2012 of financial incentives relating to any mode of travel in which the impact on active travel, physical activity, or obesity levels was reported. It encompassed macroenvironmental schemes, such as gasoline taxes, and microenvironmental schemes, such as employer-subsidized bicycles. Five relevant reviews and 20 primary studies (of which nine were not included in the reviews) were identified.Evidence synthesisThe results show that more-robust evidence is required if policymakers are to maximize the health impact of fiscal policy relating to transport schemes of this kind.ConclusionsDrawing on a literature review and insights from the SLOTH (sleep, leisure, occupation, transportation, and home-based activities) time-budget model, this paper argues that financial incentives may have a larger role in promoting walking and cycling than is acknowledged generally