scholarly journals Passenger Capacity and Safety: Investigating the Likelihood of COVID-19 Transmission in Public Transport Modes within Makurdi Metropolis

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul T. Adeke ◽  
Kwaghgba Gbagir ◽  
Manasseh Tyogo

Following its outbreak in the Wuhan region of China, the spread of Corona Virus (COVID-19) across the world has threatened national and local authorities or policy makers and transport experts due to its effects on human mobility. This study investigated the transmissibility of COVID-19 among passengers in transit using public transport modes in Makurdi metropolis. Analytical simulation using stochastic search method called Genetic Algorithm (GA) technique was used to simulate the transmissibility of the infectious disease within enclosed spaces of transport modes based on layouts and capacities. The sum of arithmetic sequence was used as the objective function of individual arrivals in each mode, it was minimised to obtain optimum safe capacity. Capacities of public transport modes were subdivided into; Normal, Above Normal and Below Normal (50% of Normal). Findings of the experiments indicated that optimum safe capacity of minibuses, taxies, tricycles and motorcycles used in Makurdi metropolis were at 8, 3, 2 and 1 person respectively. This occurred at 50% capacity which agreed with findings of previous studies. An efficient and sustainable public transport policy framework was designed for policy makers and transport experts to help achieve safe travel and healthier living in Makurdi metropolis during the COVID-19 era. Keywords— COVID-19 transmission, Makurdi Metropolis, Modal Split, Mode capacity, Passenger Safety, Public Transport.

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 2178
Author(s):  
Songkorn Siangsuebchart ◽  
Sarawut Ninsawat ◽  
Apichon Witayangkurn ◽  
Surachet Pravinvongvuth

Bangkok, the capital city of Thailand, is one of the most developed and expansive cities. Due to the ongoing development and expansion of Bangkok, urbanization has continued to expand into adjacent provinces, creating the Bangkok Metropolitan Region (BMR). Continuous monitoring of human mobility in BMR aids in public transport planning and design, and efficient performance assessment. The purpose of this study is to design and develop a process to derive human mobility patterns from the real movement of people who use both fixed-route and non-fixed-route public transport modes, including taxis, vans, and electric rail. Taxi GPS open data were collected by the Intelligent Traffic Information Center Foundation (iTIC) from all GPS-equipped taxis of one operator in BMR. GPS probe data of all operating GPS-equipped vans were collected by the Ministry of Transport’s Department of Land Transport for daily speed and driving behavior monitoring. Finally, the ridership data of all electric rail lines were collected from smartcards by the Automated Fare Collection (AFC). None of the previous works on human mobility extraction from multi-sourced big data have used van data; therefore, it is a challenge to use this data with other sources in the study of human mobility. Each public transport mode has traveling characteristics unique to its passengers and, therefore, specific analytical tools. Firstly, the taxi trip extraction process was developed using Hadoop Hive to process a large quantity of data spanning a one-month period to derive the origin and destination (OD) of each trip. Secondly, for van data, a Java program was used to construct the ODs of van trips. Thirdly, another Java program was used to create the ODs of the electric rail lines. All OD locations of these three modes were aggregated into transportation analysis zones (TAZ). The major taxi trip destinations were found to be international airports and provincial bus terminals. The significant trip destinations of vans were provincial bus terminals in Bangkok, electric rail stations, and the industrial estates in other provinces of BMR. In contrast, electric rail destinations were electric rail line interchange stations, the central business district (CBD), and commercial office areas. Therefore, these significant destinations of taxis and vans should be considered in electric rail planning to reduce the air pollution from gasoline vehicles (taxis and vans). Using the designed procedures, the up-to-date dataset of public transport can be processed to derive a time series of human mobility as an input into continuous and sustainable public transport planning and performance assessment. Based on the results of the study, the procedures can benefit other cities in Thailand and other countries.


2016 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-65
Author(s):  
Damodaran Rajasenan ◽  
M. S. Jayakumar ◽  
Bijith George Abraham

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to link the multifarious problems of the elderly in a socio-economic and psychological framework. Design/methodology/approach – The universe of the sample is elderly left behind in emigrant households in Kerala. In total, 600 samples were mustered using multistage stratified random sampling method. The paper, with the aid of factor analysis, χ2 and correspondence analysis, blemish the principal factors responsible for the migration-induced exclusion of the elderly. Findings – The empirical result derived from the study shows that migration-induced exclusion is all pervasive in Kerala. The elderly left behind yearn for the presence of their children rather than the emigration and concomitant remittances. Research limitations/implications – The findings of the study are helpful to the policy makers to understand the issues faced by the elderly and include all stakeholders concerned to find a solution to tackle these problems faced by the elderly due to emigration of their children. Practical implications – The study is practically relevant in developing appropriate policy framework in Kerala as it illumines the role of the government to overcome the exclusionary trend and other manifold problems of the elderly. Social implications – The study sheds light to a new social problem developing in the state in the form of elderly exclusion owing to emigration of the young working groups in regional dimensions, demographic levels, community angles and the emerging culture of old age home in the Kerala economy and society. Originality/value – The study is a unique one and tries to situate the principal factors responsible for the emigration-induced exclusion of the elderly in Kerala with empirical evidence.


2022 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 58
Author(s):  
Alan Both ◽  
Lucy Gunn ◽  
Carl Higgs ◽  
Melanie Davern ◽  
Afshin Jafari ◽  
...  

Confronted with rapid urbanization, population growth, traffic congestion, and climate change, there is growing interest in creating cities that support active transport modes including walking, cycling, or public transport. The ‘30 minute city’, where employment is accessible within 30 min by active transport, is being pursued in some cities to reduce congestion and foster local living. This paper examines the spatial relationship between employment, the skills of residents, and transport opportunities, to answer three questions about Australia’s 21 largest cities: (1) What percentage of workers currently commute to their workplace within 30 min? (2) If workers were to shift to an active transport mode, what percent could reach their current workplace within 30 min? and (3) If it were possible to relocate workers closer to their employment or relocate employment closer to their home, what percentage could reach work within 30 min by each mode? Active transport usage in Australia is low, with public transport, walking, and cycling making up 16.8%, 2.8%, and 1.1% respectively of workers’ commutes. Cycling was found to have the most potential for achieving the 30 min city, with an estimated 29.5% of workers able to reach their current workplace were they to shift to cycling. This increased to 69.1% if workers were also willing and able to find a similar job closer to home, potentially reducing commuting by private motor vehicle from 79.3% to 30.9%.


2020 ◽  
Vol 66 (1) ◽  
pp. 9-13
Author(s):  
Jelena Simićević ◽  
Vladimir Molan ◽  
Nada Milosavljević

Sustainable parking management in central urban areas typically involves implementation of restrictive parking measures. Discouraged by parking measures users seek for an alternative option. Some of them self-initiatively found a way not to completely abandon driving: they drive and park outside the central area and reach the final destination by public transport. This travel pattern is known as “informal Park-and-Ride“ (PnR), and should be estimated as relatively positive because the critical “last mile” is travelled by public transport. As PnR demand grows, policy-makers should consider its formalisation and integration into the urban transport policy. This paper aims to identify informal PnR users in Belgrade and to investigate their motives, requests and preferences towards this option. The findings should be of importance when planning and developing formal PnR sites, which can largely increase user willingness to accept restrictive parking measures, i.e. to adopt more sustainable travel behaviour.


2021 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shunqi Cheng ◽  
Zhiqiang Liao ◽  
Yu Zhu

Urban green spaces (UGSs) improve the quality of life of urban inhabitants. With the acceleration of urbanization and changes in traffic networks, it remains unclear whether changes in the distribution of UGSs can satisfy the needs of all inhabitants and offer equal services to inhabitants from different socioeconomic backgrounds. This study addresses this issue by analyzing dynamic changes in UGS accessibility in 2012, 2016, and 2020 for inhabitants of the central urban area of Fuzhou in China at the community level. The study introduces multiple transportation modes for an accessibility estimation based on a framework using the two-step floating catchment area method and examines the dynamic changes in community deprivation of UGS accessibility using Kernel regularized least squares, a machine learning algorithm. The results demonstrate that spatial disparities of UGS accessibility exist among the multi-transport modes and vary with time. Communities with high accessibility to UGSs by walking are scattered around the urban area; for accessibility by cycling, the high accessibility regions expand and surround the regions with low accessibility in the core urban areas, forming a semi-enclosed spatial pattern. However, the core urban spatial orientation of UGS accessibility by public transit demonstrates a reverse trend to the above two modes. The spatial pattern of UGS accessibility also varies over time, and the growth rate of accessibility slightly declined during the study period. Furthermore, the increase in UGS accessibility tended to slow from 2016–2020 compared with 2012–2016, and the trend toward equality was also erratic. The degree of deprivation for communities first weakened and was then aggravated, corresponding to the slowdown in the growth rate of accessibility, leading to the persistence existence of social inequality. Moreover, significant deprivation mainly exists among less educated people or those using the cycling and integrated travel modes. Although public transport is developing, deprived communities, such as communities with large proportion of older people, have experienced a decline in access to UGSs by public transport. Based on these findings, the study proposes a policy framework for the balanced distribution of UGSs as part of urbanization.


Author(s):  
Muhammad Ahsanul Habib ◽  
Md Asif Hasan Anik

This study proposes a framework to analyze public discourse in Twitter to understand the impacts of COVID-19 on transport modes and mobility behavior. It also identifies reopening challenges and potential reopening strategies that are discussed by the public. First, the study collects 15,776 tweets that relate to personal opinions on transportation services posted between May 15 and June 15, 2020. Next, it applies text mining and topic modeling techniques to the tweets to determine the prominent themes, terms, and topics in those discussions to understand public feelings, behavior, and broader sentiments about the changes brought about by COVID-19 on transportation systems. Results reveal that people are avoiding public transport and shifting to using private car, bicycle, or walking. Bicycle sales have increased remarkably but car sales have declined. Cycling and walking, telecommuting, and online schools are identified as possible solutions to COVID-19 mobility problems and to reduce car usage with an aim to tackle traffic congestion in the post-pandemic world. People appreciated government decisions for funding allocation to public transport, and asked for the reshaping, restoring, and safe reopening of transit systems. Protecting transit workers, riders, shop customers and staff, and office employees is identified as a crucial reopening challenge, whereas mask wearing, phased reopening, and social distancing are proposed as effective reopening strategies. This framework can be used as a tool by decision makers to enable a holistic understanding of public opinions on transportation services during COVID-19 and formulate policies for a safe reopening.


2002 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 95-111 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julie Froud ◽  
Sukhdev Johal ◽  
Adam Leaver ◽  
Karel Williams

This paper helps to develop the social aspect of a new agenda for automobile research through focusing on motoring expenditure in the UK by poor households. It moves the social exclusion debate on by going back to Rowntree's 1901 survey, which established that poverty entailed not having enough resources to meet the needs of the household. Rowntree's analysis of primary and secondary poverty is updated here through the focus on the resources and choices of poor households, which incur significant motoring costs as the price of participation. Statistical sources and interviews in Inner and Outer London are used to explore these issues and the analysis shows that the story is one of constraint, sacrifice and precariousness. Car ownership imposes large costs on poor households, which limit other consumption opportunities. Labour market participation may depend on such sacrifices where public transport and local employment opportunities are limited. This locks poor households into a precarious cycle whereby the car is necessary to get to work and the job is necessary to keep the car on the road. Using Rowntree by analogy, the paper argues that, as well as improving public transport provision policy makers must also recognise the problem of poverty.


2018 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 40-59 ◽  
Author(s):  
Guillermo Ivan Pereira ◽  
Patrícia Pereira da Silva ◽  
Deborah Soule

The transition toward smart electricity distribution grids is transforming the European electricity sector. This has contributed to increased attention by policy makers regarding the future role of electricity distribution system operators in a more flexible, digital, and renewables-based electricity system. A better understanding on how to support the adaptation of the electricity distribution industry can contribute to the introduction of an effective policy framework. Our research provides evidence for policy design by presenting the results of a Policy Delphi study focused on business model and market design adaptation alternatives. We highlight the importance of supporting innovation and a more proactive approach to adaptation from both distribution system operators and regulators. Our findings support the importance of electricity distribution for neutral market facilitation, contributing to market development and enabling new market players. The results obtained support policy makers working on electricity sector adaptation and can contribute to the ongoing market redesign efforts under the Energy Union.


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