Impact analysis of new metro line opening on passenger flow: A case study of Shenzhen

Abstract

Metro systems, as major components of the transit system, have been significantly developed in recent years and an increasing number of new metro lines are operated in China. This paper not only analyses the short and long-term impact of new lines opening on passenger flow from passenger volume, section imbalance coefficient, direction imbalance coefficient and travel time, with the help of passenger flow data from September 2016 to October 2018 in Shenzhen but also proposes a new method to identify the growth period of the transfer flow in new lines. The result shows that the new metro lines cannot solve the problems of imbalance and congestion in Shenzhen Metro. it increased the travel time in the morning and evening peak, but largely decreased the travel time in the off-peak period. Additionally, there is a significant positive correlation between the length of the growth period and the number of transfer stations of the transfer line.