Overview
Smart cities and communities rely on efficient, reliable and robust transport systems. The TRANS-FORM research project will contribute to a better understanding of how people move in different levels of the public transport network and offer new techniques to adjust public transport services to respond to actual demand levels.
The project is a ERA-NET Co-fund Smart Cities and Communities (ENSCC) funded project with five partners - four academic and one industrial. The partners are Delft University of Technology (The Netherlands, coordinator), Linköping University (Sweden), Blekinge Institute of Technology (Sweden), École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (Switzerland) and ETRA I+D (Spain).
The overarching objective of the TRANS-FORM project is to better understand transferring dynamics in multi-modal public transport systems and develop insights, strategies and methods to support decision makers in transforming public transport usage to a seamless travel experience by using smart data.
The specific objectives are to:
- better understand the characteristics and evolution of traveller flow dynamics at three different geographical scales – transport hub, urban and regional network layers – and their integration;
- provide traveller-focused tools for measuring and modelling passenger interchange activities;
- develop innovative methods for planning and operating robust services including real-time and integrated strategies that that involve forecasting passenger behaviours;
- develop, apply, demonstrate and evaluate innovative transfer strategies under various scenarios and case studies. Practical recommendations will be drawn based on research findings.
A multi-level approach is adopted in this project for monitoring, mapping, analysing and managing urban dynamics in relation to interchanging flows. TRANS-FORM will develop strategies to coordinate transfers by taking into consideration passenger transaction data and deploy short-term predictions of passenger flows based on historical and prevailing travel patterns that partially rely on input from the behavioural models.
Three cases studies in the Netherlands, Sweden and Switzerland will measure how travellers transfer within terminals, urban and regional networks in order to develop methods for predicting passenger flows, quantify the reliability of passenger experience and evaluate strategies for improved coordination between travel modes, especially in case of disturbances.