Passenger Travel Behavior in Public Transport Corridor after the Operation of Urban Rail Transit: A Random Forest Algorithm Approach

Abstract

A competitive relationship has been generated between urban rail transit and bus transit since the operation of the former. Despite different roles in providing services in public transport corridor, they affect each other in actual situations. In terms of urban transportation planning and policy formulation, it is necessary to explore and master the rules of passengers' travel mode choice from different means. In order to study their choices between the rail transit and the bus transit after the operation of the former, taking Xiamen, China as an example, this article analyzed the overall travel features of passenger flow before and after the operation of rail transit by using the public transit IC card data from two consecutive weeks in November 2017 and November 2018. Some features of travel distance, travel time, travel cost, whether to travel in peak hours, the number of collinear stations between bus transit and rail transit or that of rail transit stations are sorted out. With random forest algorithm, a model is set up for the travel mode choice of passengers after urban rail transit is put into use to find out the impact of different travel features. The result shows that travel cost is the most crucial factor that affects passengers' decisions, followed by the number of collinear stations between bus transit and rail transit or that of rail transit stations, travel time and travel distance. Whether to travel in peak hours have less impact on their choices. This study is constructive for cities in the stage of facing competition between newly opened rail transit and bus transit and support transportation decision-making.