A discrete-time quantum walk on a graph is the repeated application of a
unitary evolution operator to a Hilbert space corresponding to the graph. If
this unitary evolution operator has an associated group of symmetries, then for
certain initial states the walk will be confined to a subspace of the original
Hilbert space. Symmetries of the original graph, given by its automorphism
group, can be inherited by the evolution operator. We show that a quantum walk
confined to the subspace corresponding to this symmetry group can be seen as a
different quantum walk on a smaller quotient graph. We give an explicit
construction of the quotient graph for any subgroup of the automorphism group
and illustrate it with examples. The automorphisms of the quotient graph which
are inherited from the original graph are the original automorphism group
modulo the subgroup used to construct it. We then analyze the behavior of
hitting times on quotient graphs. Hitting time is the average time it takes a
walk to reach a given final vertex from a given initial vertex. It has been
shown in earlier work [Phys. Rev. A {\bf 74}, 042334 (2006)] that the hitting
time can be infinite. We give a condition which determines whether the quotient
graph has infinite hitting times given that they exist in the original graph.
We apply this condition for the examples discussed and determine which quotient
graphs have infinite hitting times. All known examples of quantum walks with
fast hitting times correspond to systems with quotient graphs much smaller than
the original graph; we conjecture that the existence of a small quotient graph
with finite hitting times is necessary for a walk to exhibit a quantum
speed-up.Comment: 18 pages, 7 figures in EPS forma