An information integration approach for waiting room management in high speed railway stations

Purpose This paper aims to propose a systematic approach to facilitate passenger flow in high speed rail (HSR) stations. A case study is conducted to validate the approach. Design/methodology/approach This paper argues that HSR station management consists of train management, station capacity management, waiting room management and passenger flow management, and that two-way and dynamic information exchange exists among the components. Accordingly, the proposed approach integrates the components in HSR station management based on information exchange and heuristic algorithms. A HSR station in China with four regular waiting rooms, one mother-and-infant waiting room and one VIP waiting room located on two floors are chosen for a case study. An arrangement plan for waiting zones and waiting rooms is generated by following the proposed approach. Findings The result of the case study indicates that the proposed approach is capable of arranging waiting zones and waiting rooms quickly and effectively to maximize utilization of waiting room capacity and to minimize passenger walking distance from waiting rooms to platforms. Research limitations/implications The management problem of railway station waiting room also relates to some other factors such as platforms, tracks adjustment and delay of the trains. As an emerging technology, the Internet of Things (IoT) is expected to offer promising solutions to transform the operation and role of many existing industrial systems such as transportation systems including railway systems. The future study of the authors will focus on IoT intelligent railway management system. Practical implications The result indicates that the proposed method is an effective solution to the management of railway station waiting room, which can be applied to railway station management system. Social implications China Railway System provides service to billions of passengers. This research has significant social-economic impacts. Originality/value This paper fulfills an information integrated approach for improving waiting room management in high speed railway stations and a case study testing the approach.