On urban mass transit network, some connections inherently exist between trains on different lines through transfer stations. Schedule coordination for different lines, especially optimizing the arriving and departure times at transfer stations, may significantly reduce transfer waiting times at stations where various routes are interconnected, so as to improve the passenger service level. Based on the passengers flow characters of urban mass transit (UMT), both the convenience and rationality of connection between different lines were considered, and then an optimization model, with the aims of the minimal total waiting time of transfer passengers and inboard passengers, was set up. Combining the inner coordination of arriving and departure time sequence of trains in transfer nodes with the exterior coordination of transfer nodes on whole urban mass transit network, a multi-layers coordination policy was proposed, and the integrated optimization of the urban mass transit system was realized through taking some small time shifts of the proposed singleline timetables. In order to verify the validity and feasibility of the model and algorithm, we conducted an experimental study. The result turns out that improvement on UMT network can be determined by such optimization techniques.
Cost-saving properties of schedule coordination in a simple trunk-and-feeder transit system