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Logistics Challenges Vol 33 No 6 (2021)

Patricija Bajec, Ivona Bajor
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 6

Danijela Tuljak-Suban, Valter Suban
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 6

Vessels of the shipping industry produce sludge during the operation of the main engine, various types of auxiliary engines, and the handling of fuel oil on board ships. The sludge can be stored in special tanks and disposed of ashore or burned on board. In the European Union, according to the Port Reception Facilities Directive (EU) 2019/883, ships have to pay a port waste fee for the delivery of ship waste, which is calculated according to the size of the ship. Such an approach does not take into account the capacity of port green waste logistics. In this paper, the case of delivery of ship sludge to ports that are similar in terms of waste logistics capacity is analysed. It is presented as a mathematical game between ships and ports to improve green waste logistics and match the amount of oil sludge that can be discharged from ships to the capacity of ports. The goal of the game is to discourage free-riders, which can occur on both sides, between suppliers and ports. The waste rate can be used as a regulator and incentive that discourages sludge dumping when recycling is not feasible. A model evaluation is proposed using a numerical example.


Dario Ogrizović, Ana Perić Hadžić, Mladen Jardas
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 6

With the increasing development and popularisation of information and communication technology, new challenges are posed to higher education in the modernisation of teaching in order to make education and training of students as effective as possible. It is therefore very important to develop and experiment with appropriate development tools, explore their benefits and effectiveness, and integrate them into existing learning strategies. The emergence of a computer-generated digital environment that can be directly experienced, actions that can determine what is happening in it, growth of technological characteristics, and decline in prices of virtual reality hardware leads to a situation that cannot be ignored. This paper investigated users' perceptions on the potential use of fully immersive virtual reality head-mounted displays in a discrete-event simulation of logistics processes. The dynamic nature of virtual environments requires active participation which causes greater engagement, motivation, and interest aided by interaction and challenges.


Kilian J. Saenger, Timo Simon, Florian Heinitz
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 6

Based on an analysis of the developments to date, this article originates from and then substantiates long-discussed approaches of a fast, periodic unaccompanied combined rail freight transport network for Germany that corresponds to the target modal split. A four-stage scenario of a market entry is developed. The presented solution incorporates potentially novel aspects such as a network design based on the Deutschlandtakt Cargo integrated periodic timetable framework, the prospective quantity structures as of 2030, and a segmentation for a route-specific mix of two major shipping container types. The set of assessment indicators derived by the model allows to gain insights on the achievable capacities and service levels versus the addressable freight transport demand as well as consequential cost/benefit functions.


Bálint Csendes, Gábor Albert, Norina Szander, András Munkácsy
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 6

Road transport plays an essential role in freight transport throughout Europe, therefore, conditions that may hinder seamless operations in this sector require thorough consideration for evidence-based action. Critical amongst these key conditions is how, when, and where truck drivers stop, as a common set of rules strictly regulates their driving times and rest periods, which causes mandatory interruptions in the supply chains. However, approximating reliable estimations of freight traffic flows and road infrastructure usage constitutes a considerable challenge for researchers. This paper presents a robust data processing approach to designate rest area stops and to calculate the pertaining driving and rest times. Drawing on the abundance of navigation information provided by private fleet toll registration services, a comprehensive spatial-temporal truck stop database on all major rest areas along the toll road network in Hungary has been compiled. Based on the assessment and comparison of driving and rest times, driving and parking times have been analysed, including micro-scale analysis of particular rest areas. Both the methods applied and the results achieved can be of strategic interest to better understand truck driving patterns, as well as to develop targeted and cost-effective measures to streamline freight transport operations in other contexts.


Muhammad Qasim, Csaba Csiszar
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 6

The article analyses the issues concerning the reluctance of logistics professionals to adopt medium-sized electric trucks (ET) in the logistics system. Logistics trucks are oversized polluters, considered to be one of the hardest to be addressed for the reduction of CO2 emissions. It aims to identify the major barriers hindering the spread of ETs in logistics. The total cost of ownership (TCO) comparison between a traditional and electric truck has revealed the price gap at the end of a useful lifecycle is marginal. Incentivisation can bridge the gap. This research was based on a survey conducted among professionals from the logistics field in Budapest. Responses recorded were analysed by descriptive statistics to identify highly-rated barriers and their priorities. Based on the results, recommendations were suggested to facilitate the adoption of ETs.


Bogdan Marković, Milan Marković
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 6

The topic of the paper is the application of dual approach in formulation and resolution of goods distribution tasks problems. The gap in previous goods distribution research is the absence of the methodologies and goods transportation calculation methods for manufacturing companies with not too large amount of goods distribution whereby goods distribution is not the core activity. The goal of this paper is to find a solution for transportation in such companies. In such cases it is not rational to procure a specific software for the improvement of goods transportation but rather apply the calculation presented in this paper. The aim of this paper from mathematical aspect is to show the convenience of switching from the basic geometric interpretation of linear programming applied on transportation tasks to dual approach for the companies with too many costs limitations per transport task but not enough available transportation means. Recent research studies that use dual approach in linear programming are generally not applied to transportation tasks although such approach is very convenient. The goal of the paper is also to resolve transportation tasks by both primal and dual approach in order to prove the correctness of the method.


Wen-Kai K. Hsu, Show-Hui S. Huang, Nguyen Tan Huynh
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 6

With the tendency of internationalisation and globalisation, signing regional economic agreements among multiple countries has become a trend. Under such an integration environment, some free economic zones with port transportation functions have become crucial for FDI (foreign direct investment) investors in selecting investment locations. The free trade port zone (FTPZ) is argued to be one of the most well-known. This paper aims to assess the FDI performance of FTPZs. On the basis of the FTPZ's features and relevant literature, assessment criteria (ACs) are initially identified. An evaluation model based on the fuzzy AHP (Analytic Hierarchy Process) approach is then introduced to evaluate the FTPZs' FDI performance from foreign investors' viewpoints. Finally, the FTPZ of the Kaohsiung port in Taiwan was empirically investigated to verify the assessment model. Results point out that for the FTPZ of Kaohsiung port, ACs with higher priorities needing improvement are raw material acquired, local government efficiency, and political stability and social security. Theoretical and practical recommendations for the FTPZ managers are discussed based on the results.


Sezen Korkulu, Krisztián Bóna
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 6

Management of heat stress and metabolic cost is vital for preventing any work-related disorders. In this paper, we integrated rest time formulations for heat strain and metabolic cost to develop a new lot sizing model for preventing heat exposure and work-related musculoskeletal disorders. The effects of heat strain and rest allowance on the total cost of the production supply process were investigated. The problem studied in this paper was the handling of the raw materials placed in boxes by manual material handling in order to supply the material requirement of a production line placed in a production area. For the realisation of the material handling transactions between the raw material warehouse and the production line, Electric Pallet Jack (EPJ) was used. The study covers the investigation of picking, storing, and carrying motions for the manual handling of these materials. The result of the analysis has shown that 8.5% savings were achieved by using the heat strain and rest time in comparison to the total cost of this part of the production line supply process with the ISO 7243 maximum metabolic work limit. Consequentially, the analysis results showed that the developed method demonstrated the viability of lot sizing model optimisation with multiple objectives and complex constraints with regards to the metabolic cost and heat strain.


Huimin Ge, Haisheng Liu, Rui Wang, Shuai Zhu, Linbei Shao
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 6

In this COVID-19 epidemic, due to insufficient awareness of the impact of sudden public health emergencies on agricultural logistics at this stage, agricultural products were left unsold, stocks were backlogged, and losses were severe. In the process of distribution, we should not only ensure a short time cycle and avoid the contamination of agricultural products by foreign bacteria, but also pay attention to the waste of human, material, and financial resources. Therefore, this study mainly adopts the combination of the petrochemical network and block chain to build an agricultural products emergency logistics model. This paper first shows the operation mechanism of the petri dish network and blockchain coupling in the form of a graph and then uses the culture network modelling and simulation tool PIPE to directly verify the construction model. It is proved that the structure and overall business process of the agricultural products logistics system constructed by combining the Petri net and block chain are reasonable, reliable, and feasible in practical application and development. It is hoped that this study can provide a reference direction for agricultural emergency logistics.


Larissa Lößer
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 6

Low-emission planning in freight transportation is one of the main levers to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. For a sustainable planning approach, a strategic solution for this planning problem is needed. Based on several literature reviews, a procedure model is developed, which is meant to be used for the development and adjustment of a low-emission transportation chain reference model. The procedure model consists of the decision steps needed to develop a low-emission transportation chain (LETC) reference model and it is structured into main decision processes and sub-decision processes. A first draft of the LETC-Model is presented in form of an ARIS-Express model.

 


Roman Hruška, Matej Kmetík, Jan Chocholáč
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 6

To remain competitive and respond to rapidly changing markets, we need to increase flexibility in today's global marketplace. In this respect, the selection of the appropriate mode of transport is one of the most important functions to be performed by logistics. The selection of the appropriate mode of transport is a multi-criteria problem involving both quantitative and qualitative criteria. This paper deals with the selection of the mode of transport using the Analytic Hierarchy Process method (AHP). AHP is a method of decomposing a complex unstructured situation into simpler components to create a hierarchical system problem. This paper describes a general model of selection of transport mode using AHP including its application to a manufacturing company that selects the appropriate mode of transport from three potential transport modes. The aim of this paper is to create a useful decision support tool for selection of the transport mode using the AHP method within distribution logistics of motor fuels. This tool helps companies to make the right decision on the choice of transport mode by taking into account different importance of the different criteria that influence the decision-making process.


Michaela Novotná, Dalibor Gottwald
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 6

The article’s focus is on the postal services sector. The sector plays an important role in a process of delivering packages to the customers. Over the last few years, there has been a significant growth in volume of shipments transported. The aim of the article is to demonstrate the current development and subsequent prediction of two selected indicators that play an important role in the context of e-commerce development in the V4 states. One of the indicators is the number of shipments; the other is the indicator of CO2 emissions. While the values of the CO2 emission in the predictive analysis in comparison with the growing e-commerce turnover indicator stagnate, the number of shipments is growing alongside the e-commerce turnover values. In the light of these findings, it is clear that the growing number of shipments will result in the need to change the approach to the organisation of the parcel delivery process, especially in big cities and agglomerations. It is also necessary to mention that organisational changes in the parcel delivery process in big cities and agglomerations must be carried out in an environmentally friendly way.


Matúš Materna, Benedikt Badánik, Alena Novák Sedláčková, Andrea Maternová
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 5

This paper deals with the on-going process of commercialisation of air navigation service providers (ANSPs) with specific focus on Europe. First part offers overview of conducted research on their commercialisation and identifies two main external drivers for the emergence of commercialisation – liberalisation of national markets and demand for other ANS related services. Our research also proposes methodology for numerical assessment of the degree of commercialisation based on the ANSP’s Commercialisation Index (ACI) and presents numerical evaluation of the ACI index of 35 European providers and proposes six different categories of providers reflecting different degree of their commercialisation. Results reveal that 63% of the European ANSPs show signs of commercialisation. On top of that, our outcomes prove that corporatisation cannot be considered a direct manifestation of commercialisation. Despite the most widely accepted view that corporatised providers are commercially active, the findings show that almost 40% of corporatised European ANSPs are not commercially active. The paper also claims that ownership of subsidiaries and joint ventures is the most dominant demonstration of commercialisation. At the same time, our outcomes show that the provision and development of commercial services and products related to ANS are the most common commercial activities of the European ANSPs.


Songwei Liu, Junfeng Zhang, Zihan Peng, Haipeng Guo, Anle Pi
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 5

The arrival management (AMAN) system is a decision support tool for air traffic controllers to establish and maintain the landing sequence for arrival aircraft. The original intention of designing the AMAN system is to improve the efficiency of air traffic management (ATM), but few studies are investigating the operational benefits of this system based on key performance indicators (KPIs) and evaluating actual data in a real-time environment. The main purpose of this paper is to propose a KPI based transferable comparative analysis method for identifying the operational benefits of the AMAN through radar trajectories. Firstly, six KPIs are established from a joint study of the mainstream ATM performance frameworks worldwide. Secondly, appropriate evaluation technique approaches are determined according to the characteristics of each KPI. Finally, a Chinese metropolitan airport is taken for the case study, and three periods are defined to form data samples with high similarity for comparative experiments. The results validate the feasibility of the proposed method and find comprehensive performance improvements in arrival operations under the effects of the AMAN system.


Liza Babaoglu, Ceni Babaoglu
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 5

Traffic collisions affect millions around the world and are the leading cause of death for children and young adults. Thus, Canada’s road safety plan is to reduce collision injuries and fatalities with a vision of making the safest roads in the world. We aim to predict fatalities of collisions on Canadian roads, and to discover causation of fatalities through exploratory data analysis and machine learning techniques. We analyse the vehicle collisions from Canada’s National Collision Database (1999–2017.) Through data mining methodologies, we investigate association rules and key contributing factors that lead to fatalities. Then, we propose two supervised learning classification models, Lasso Regression and XGBoost, to predict fatalities. Our analysis shows the deadliness of head-on collisions, especially in non-intersection areas with lacking traffic control systems. We also reveal that most collision fatalities occur in non-extreme weather and road conditions. Our prediction models show that the best classifier of fatalities is XGBoost with 83% accuracy. Its most important features are “collision configuration” and “used safety devices” elements, outnumbering attributes such as vehicle year, collision time, age, or sex of the individual. Our exploratory and predictive analysis reveal the importance of road design and traffic safety education.


Junsheng Huang, Tong Zhang, Runbin Wei
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 5

Due to the congested scenarios of the urban railway system during peak hours, passengers are often left behind on the platform. This paper firstly brings a proposal to capture passengers matching different trains. Secondly, to reduce passengers’ total waiting time, timetable optimisation is put forward based on passengers matching different trains. This is a two-stage model. In the first stage, the aim is to obtain a match between passengers and different trains from the Automatic Fare Collection (AFC) data as well as timetable parameters. In the second stage, the objective is to reduce passengers’ total waiting time, whereby the decision variables are headway and dwelling time. Due to the complexity of our proposed model, an MCMC-GASA (Markov Chain Monte Carlo-Genetic Algorithm Simulated Annealing) hybrid method is designed to solve it. A real-world case of Line 1 in Beijing metro is employed to verify the proposed two-stage model and algorithms. The results show that several improvements have been brought by the newly designed timetable. The number of unique matching passengers increased by 37.7%, and passengers’ total waiting time decreased by 15.5%.


Tadej Brezina, Borna Abramović, Denis Šipuš, Takeru Shibayama
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 5

Railway infrastructures and services in the countries of former Yugoslavia have been in a downward spiral since the early 1990s. There have been scattered investments to lift services up to appealing levels after the war, but a continuous downward trend persists in all important performance indicators. After war-attributed abandonment, numerous lines lost services permanently, numbers of services dwindled, especially across borders, and service speeds decreased. This research takes Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina specifically as survey objects. It aims to identify the barriers in these two countries that withheld passenger rail from a positive development as in other European countries during the same period. For this purpose we carried out 11 interviews with stakeholders in various railway-related institutions. The transcripts are analysed qualitatively with thematic analysis to gain an overview of organisational and institutional barriers for development of railways. This is followed by a cause-effect analysis with Causal Loop Diagramming. The result: ad-hoc decision-making is clearly connected to the insignificance of railways. As immediate measures to counter the downward spiral by means of strategic long term planning, we identify (1) service benchmarking, (2) a clear vision for improvement of service quality, and (3) empowerment of ministries in a long term.


Xijin Lu, Changxi Ma
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 5

The aim of this paper is to conduct a spatial correlation study of virus transmission in the Hubei province, China. The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases released by the National Health and Construction Commission, the traffic flow data provided by Baidu migration, and the current situation of Wuhan intercity traffic were collected. The Moran’s I test shows that there is a positive spatial correlation between the 17 cities in the Hubei province. The result of Moran’s I test also shows that four different policies to restrict inter-city traffic can be issued for the four types of cities. The ordinary least squares regression, spatial lag model, spatial error model, and spatial lag error model were built. Based on the analysis of the spatial lag error model, whose goodness of fit is the highest among the four models, it can be concluded that the speed of COVID-19 spread within a certain region is not only related to the current infection itself but also associated with the scale of the infection in the surrounding area. Thus, the spill-over effect of the COVID-19 is also presented. This paper bridges inter-city traffic and spatial economics, provides a theoretical contribution, and verifies the necessity of a lockdown from an empirical point of view.


Xiaoli Deng, Yao Hu, Qian Hu
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 5

A new statistical algorithm is proposed in this paper with the aim of estimating fundamental diagram (FD) in actual traffic and dividing the traffic state. Traditional methods mainly focus on sensor data, but this paper takes random probe pairs as research objects. First, a mathematical method is proposed by using probe pairs data and the jam density to determine the FD on a stationary segment. Second, we applied it to the near-stationary probe traffic state set through linear regression and expectation maximisation iterative algorithm, estimating the free flow speed and the backward wave speed and dividing the traffic state based on the 95% confidence interval of the estimated FD. Finally, simulation and empirical analyses are used to verify the new algorithm. The simulation analysis results show that the estimation error corresponding to the free flow speed and the backward wave speed are 1.0668 km/h and 0.0002 km/h respectively. The empirical analysis calculates the maximum capacity of the road and divides the traffic into three states (free flow state, breakdown state, and congested state), which demonstrates the accuracy and practicability of the research in this paper, and provides a reference for urban traffic monitoring and government decision-making.


Guohua Liang, Xujiao Sun, Yidan Zhang, Mingli Chen, Wanting Zhang
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 5

For the purpose of reducing the harm of expressway traffic accidents and improving the accuracy of traffic accident black spots identification, this paper proposes a method for black spots identification of expressway accidents based on road unit secondary division and empirical Bayes method. Based on the modelling ideas of expressway accident prediction models in HSM (Highway Safety Manual), an expressway accident prediction model is established as a prior distribution and combined with empirical Bayes method safety estimation to obtain a Bayes posterior estimate. The posterior estimated value is substituted into the quality control method to obtain the black spots identification threshold. Finally, combining the Xi'an-Baoji expressway related data and using the method proposed in this paper, a case study of Xibao Expressway is carried out, and sections 9, 19, and 25 of Xibao Expressway are identified as black spots. The results show that the method of secondary segmentation based on dynamic clustering can objectively describe the concentration and dispersion of accident spots on the expressway, and the proposed black point recognition method based on empirical Bayes method can accurately identify accident black spots. The research results of this paper can provide a basis for decision-making of expressway management departments, take targeted safety improvement measures.


Xuchuan Li, Lingkun Fan, Tao Chen, Shuaicong Guo
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 5

The ability to predict the motion of vehicles is essential for autonomous vehicles. Aiming at the problem that existing models cannot make full use of the external parameters including the outline of vehicles and the lane, we proposed a model to use the external parameters thoroughly when predicting the trajectory in the straight-line and non-free flow state. Meanwhile, dynamic sensitive area is proposed to filter out inconsequential surrounding vehicles. The historical trajectory of the vehicles and their external parameters are used as inputs. A shared Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) cell is proposed to encode the explicit states obtained by mapping historical trajectory and external parameters. The hidden states of vehicles obtained from the last step are used to extract latent driving intent. Then, a convolution layer is designed to fuse hidden states to feed into the next prediction circle and a decoder is used to decode the hidden states of the vehicles to predict trajectory. The experiment result shows that the dynamic sensitive area can shorten the training time to 75.86% of the state-of-the-art work. Compared with other models, the accuracy of our model is improved by 23.7%. Meanwhile, the model's ability of anti-interference of external parameters is also improved.


Duygu Ülker, Birsen Koldemir
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 5

The seasonal domestic yacht traffic direction in Turkey from the Marmara Sea and South coasts of Turkey at the beginning of the Summer and opposite direction at the end of the Summer or beginning of the Autumn. Considering the long-distance and long sailing time between the routes of seasonal yacht moving, this study revealed whether the yacht carrying in domestic shipping can be feasible for yacht owners and ship owners. The technical and managing perspective of port and ship selection criteria are indicated for yacht carrying. Estimations are done for the selected sample ship and yacht model and selected loading/discharging ports. All of the voyage expenses are formulated and written in MatLab. The voyage costs of the sample ship and  yacht model are estimated to evaluate the feasibility of yacht carrying between the Bodrum and Haydarpaşa Port. The cost of a yacht carrying between the ports is  acceptable depends on the number of yachts, speed of yacht and yacht type carried. The long coastline and yacht traffic potential of Turkey  give the opportunity of effectiveness for shipping of yachts in the domestic line.


Pengfei Liu, Wei Fan
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 5

Connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs) have the ability to receive information on their leading vehicles through multiple sensors and vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) technology and then predict their future behaviour thus to improve roadway safety and mobility. This study presents an innovative algorithm for connected and autonomous vehicles to determine their trajectory considering surrounding vehicles. For the first time, the XGBoost model is developed to predict the acceleration rate that the object vehicle should take based on the current status of both the object vehicle and its leading vehicle. Next Generation Simulation (NGSIM) datasets are utilised for training the proposed model. The XGBoost model is compared with the Intelligent Driver Model (IDM), which is a prior state-of-the-art model. Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) and Mean Absolute Error (MAE) are applied to evaluate the two models. The results show that the XGBoost model outperforms the IDM in terms of prediction errors. The analysis of the feature importance reveals that the longitudinal position has the greatest influence on vehicle trajectory prediction results.


Dongmei Yan, Yan, Dongmei , , Jianhua Guo
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 5

The limited driving range and the unavailability or insufficiency of battery charging/swapping stations cause the so-called range anxiety issue for traffic assignment involving battery electric vehicle (BEV) users. In addition, expected utility theory-based stochastic user equilibrium (EUT-SUE) model generates the perfectly rational issue when the travellers make route choice decisions. To tackle these two problems, this article improves the cumulative prospect theory-based stochastic user equilibrium (CPT-SUE) model in a degradable transport network through incorporating the constraints of multiple user classes and distance limit. In this degradable network, the travellers experience stochastic travel times due to network link capacity degradations. For this improved CPT-SUE model, the equivalent variational inequality (VI) model and associated method of successive averages (MSA) based solution are provided. The improved CPT-SUE model is tested and compared with the EUT-SUE model with distance limit, with results showing that the improved CPT-SUE model can handle jointly the range anxiety issue and the perfectly rational issue.


Doris Novak
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 5

Javier Cifuentes-Faura, Ursula Faura-Martínez
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 4

This paper analyses the scientific study on airport efficiency in the WoS (Web of Science) database for the period 2000–2019. Productivity indicators have been obtained by author, years, journals, and institutions, and an analysis of visibility, impact, and scientific collaboration through co-citations was performed. The areas of greatest application are transport, engineering, and economics. This study reveals the existence of three research lines, one on airport safety and management, another on technical efficiency using mainly the DEA method, and the third associated with airport regularization issues. An important issue which is increasingly taken into account in efficiency studies is related to environmental aspects. In the ranking of journals publishing on airport efficiency, ordered by number of articles indexed in WoS, Journal of Air Transport Management is the one with the highest number of cited articles and publications, whereas Sustainability stands out as the first non-specific journal on transport. The University of Lisbon and the University of British Columbia are the ones that deal most with airport efficiency.


Tolga Temucin, Gulfem Tuzkaya, Ozalp Vayvay
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 4

The airline industry has shown significant growth in the last decade according to some indicators such as annual average growth in global air traffic passenger demand and growth rate in the global air transport fleet. This inevitable progress makes the airline industry challenging and forces airline companies to produce a range of solutions that increase consumer loyalty to the brand. These solutions to reduce the high costs encountered in airline operations, prevent delays in planned departure times, improve service quality, or reduce environmental impacts can be diversified according to the need. Although one can refer to past surveys, it is not sufficient to cover the rich literature of airline scheduling, especially for the last decade. This study aims to fill this gap by reviewing the airline operations related papers published between 2009 and 2019, and focus on the ones especially in the aircraft maintenance routing area which seems a promising branch.


Weite Lu
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 4

The concept of sharing transport infrastructure has become increasingly prominent in the sustainable society due to limited resources in urban cities. Shared lanes where cars, electric motorcycles, and bicycles are permitted have been promoted in urban China to overcome the shortage of road space available to meet the increasing traffic demand. Based on VR video and questionnaire survey, this study has identified that the levels of satisfaction of drivers, e-motorcyclists, and cyclists are associated with the factors of traffic condition and lane characteristics among various shared lanes. Based on the analysis of data by a multinomial ordered logistic regression model, the major findings of this study are summarised as follows: (1) Satisfaction was mainly affected by lane width, lane number, lane type, and presence of parking space in the driver group. (2) Lane width, lane number, lane type, presence of parking space, speed, and lateral separation were the main factors in the e-motorcyclist group. (3) For the group of cyclists, lane width, lane number, presence of slope, presence of parking space, speed, and lateral separation were identified as the main factors. Our study will help local government officials to design more effective sustainable transport infrastructures.


Siniša Vilke, Davor Mance, Borna Debelić, Marinko Maslarić
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 4

The paper tests for statistical association between employment and value added of freight transport industry and its component activities against overall economy in a ten-year panel ranging from 2008 to 2017 of the thirteen newest European Union member countries. In this paper, the nature of correlation between economic growth as the independent variable and freight transport industry as a dependent variable is examined. To achieve stationarity, and to lose autocorrelation and the idiosyncratic effects, the variables are first differenced. The results of the “Granger causality” tests show the null hypothesis of no-causation may be rejected for most conjectures with high F-Statistics as well as high statistical significance. The results of the Panel EGLS cross-section fixed effects do not reject the results gained by the Granger test, and the same may be said for the Panel Generalised Method of Moments First Differences test. The result of the Arellano-Bond test shows no serial correlation in the residuals. It has been concluded that changes in overall economy (value added and employment) have a significant and measurably strong impact on freight transportation and warehousing sector. This conclusion is useful in assessing future impacts on freight transport industry, especially as a consequence of contingent events.


Aijia Zhang, Tiezhu Li, Ran Tu, Changyin Dong, Haibo Chen, Jianbing Gao, Ye Liu
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 4

The recharging plans are a key component of the electric bus schedule. Since the real-world charging function of electric vehicles follows a nonlinear relationship with the charging duration, it is challenging to accurately estimate the charging time. To provide a feasible bus schedule given the nonlinear charging function, this paper proposes a mixed integer programming model with a piecewise linear charging approximation and multi-depot and multi-vehicle type scheduling. The objective of the model is to minimise the total cost of the schedule, which includes the vehicle purchasing cost and operation cost. From a practical point of view, the number of line changes of each bus is also taken as one of the constraints in the optimisation. An improved heuristic algorithm is then proposed to find high-quality solutions of the problem with an efficient computation. Finally, a real-world dataset is used for the case study. The results of using different charging functions indicate a large deviation between the linear charging function and the piecewise linear approximation, which can effectively avoid the infeasible bus schedules. Moreover, the experiments show that the proposed line change constraints can be an effective control method for transit operators.


Yajuan Deng, Mingli Chen
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 4

Real-time transit information (RTI) service can provide travellers with information on public transport and guide them to arrange departure time and travel mode accordingly. This paper aims to analyse travellers’ choices under RTI by exploring the relationship between the related variables of RTI and passengers’ travel choice. Based on the stated preference (SP) survey data, the ordinal logistic regression model is established to analyse the changing probability of passengers’ travel behaviour under RTI. The model calculation results show that travellers getting off work are more likely to change their travel choice under RTI. When data from the control and experimental groups are compared, the differences in route selection are significant. Specifically, passengers with RTI have a more complex route selection than those without, including their changes of travel mode, departure time, vehicles, and stop choices. The research findings can provide insights into the optimisation of intelligent transit information systems and the strategy of RTI. Also, the analysis of passengers’ travel choice under RTI in the transit network can help to improve network planning.


Huang Yan, Xiaoning Zhang
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 4

The need to make effective plans for locating transportation hubs is of increasing importance in the megaregional area, as recent research suggests that the growing intercity travel demand affects the efficiency of a megaregional transportation system. This paper investigates a hierarchical facility location problem in a megaregional passenger transportation network. The aim of the study is to determine the locations of hub facilities at different hierarchical levels and distribute the demands to these facilities with minimum total cost, including investment, transportation, and congestion costs. The problem is formulated as a mixed-integer nonlinear programming model considering the service availability structure and hub congestion effects. A case study is designed to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed model in the Wuhan metropolitan area. The results show that the congestion effects can be addressed by reallocating the demand to balance the hub utilisation or constructing new hubs to increase the network capacity. The methods of appropriately locating hubs and distributing traffic flows are proposed to optimise the megaregional passenger transportation networks, which has important implications for decision makers.


Yifan Sun, Chaozhong Wu, Hui Zhang, Wenhui Chu, Yiying Xiao, Yijun Zhang
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 4

Individual differences (IDs) may reduce the detection-accuracy of drowsiness-driving by influencing measurements’ drowsiness-detection performance (MDDP). The purpose of this paper is to propose a model that can quantify the effects of IDs on MDDP and find measurements with less impact by IDs to build drowsiness-detection models. Through field experiments, drivers’ naturalistic driving data and subjective-drowsiness levels were collected, and drowsiness-related measurements were calculated using the double-layer sliding time window. In the model, MDDP was represented by |Z-statistics| of the Wilcoxon-test. First, the individual driver’s measurements were analysed by Wilcoxon-test. Next, drivers were combined in pairs, measurements of paired-driver combinations were analysed by Wilcoxon-test, and measurement’s IDs of paired-driver combinations were calculated. Finally, linear regression was used to fit the measurements’ IDs and changes of MDDP that equalled the individual driver’s |Z-statistics| minus the paired-driver combination’s |Z-statistics|, and the slope’s absolute value (|k|) indicated the effects of ID on the MDDP. As a result, |k| of the mean of the percentage of eyelid closure (MPECL) is the lowest (4.95), which illustrates MPECL is the least affected by IDs. The results contribute to the measurement selection of drowsiness-detection models considering IDs.


Manel Terraza, Ji Zhang, Zongzhi Li
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 4

The ever-increasing travel demand outpacing available transportation capacity especially in the U.S. urban areas has led to more severe traffic congestion and delays. This study proposes a methodology for intersection signal timing optimisation for an urban street network aimed to minimise intersection-related delays by dynamically adjusting green splits of signal timing plans designed for intersections in an urban street network in each hour of the day in response to varying traffic entering the intersections. Two options are considered in optimisation formulation, which are concerned with minimising vehicle delays per cycle, and minimising weighted vehicle and pedestrian delays per cycle calculated using the 2010 Highway Capacity Manual (HCM) method. The hourly vehicular traffic is derived by progressively executing a regional travel demand forecasting model that could handle interactions between signal timing plans and predicted vehicular traffic entering intersections, coupled with pedestrian crossing counts. A computational study is conducted for methodology application to the central business district (CBD) street network in Chicago, USA. Relative weights for calculating weighted vehicle and pedestrian delays, and intersection degrees of saturation are revealed to be significant factors affecting the effectiveness of network-wide signal timing optimisation. For the current study, delay reductions are maximised using a weighting split of 78/22 between vehicle and pedestrian delays.


Chuhao Zhou, Peiqun Lin, Xukun Lin, Yang Cheng
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 4

Accurate traffic prediction on a large-scale road network is significant for traffic operations and management. In this study, we propose an equation for achieving a comprehensive and accurate prediction that effectively combines traffic data and non-traffic data. Based on that, we developed a novel prediction model, called the adaptive deep neural network (ADNN). In the ADNN, we use two long short-term memory (LSTM) networks to extract spatial-temporal characteristics and temporal characteristics, respectively. A backpropagation neural network (BPNN) is also employed to represent situations from contextual factors such as station index, forecast horizon, and weather. The experimental results show that the prediction of ADNN for different stations and different forecast horizons has high accuracy; even for one hour ahead, its performance is also satisfactory. The comparison of ADNN and several benchmark prediction models also indicates the robustness of the ADNN.


Lingxiang Wei, Pengfei Zhao, Yuxuan Li, Yinjia Chen, Mingjun Liao
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 4

Mopeds (electric bicycles and light motorcycles) are commonly used as a personal transportation mode in China. However, the understanding of characteristics of left-turning mopeds at signal-controlled intersections has been relatively limited. To bridge this gap, firstly, this paper proposed a video conversion method of moped movement data acquisition. Then, a method of data accuracy verification was introduced by comparing the results between the field experiment and the video conversion method. Secondly, the ideal traffic space for left-turn mopeds from different entrances was defined to analyse the characteristics of the left-turning mopeds at intersections. Further, three indicators, namely, transverse distance, the proportion of left-turning mopeds with crossing behaviour, and the average number of avoidance behaviour, were proposed and used to analyse the asymmetrical characteristics behaviour, crossing behaviour, and avoidance behaviour. Finally, based on empirical data collected from five signal-controlled intersections, the proposed methods and behaviours were analysed. This paper provides both a valid method of obtaining the position data of mopeds and a reliable basis for improving the safety of left-turning moped riders at urban signal-controlled intersections.


Zdenko Kljaić, Danijel Pavković, Tomislav Josip Mlinarić, Mladen Nikšić
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 4

This paper presents the design of a fuzzy logic-based traffic scheduling algorithm aimed at reducing traffic congestion for the case of partial obstruction of a bidirectional traffic lane. Such a problem is typically encountered in rail traffic and personal rapid transportation systems with predefined and fixed traffic corridors. The proposed proportional-derivative (PD) fuzzy control algorithm, serving as a traffic control automaton, alternately assigns adaptive green light periods to traffic coming from each direction. The proposed fuzzy logic-based traffic controller has been compared with the conventional traffic control automaton featuring fixed-durations of green light intervals. The comparison has been carried out within a simulation environment for four different probability distributions of stochastic traffic flows at each end of the considered traffic corridor. Results have shown that the proposed fuzzy logic-based traffic controller performance is far superior to that of the conventional traffic control law in terms of achieving shorter vehicle queue lengths and less disparity in queue lengths for all considered simulation scenarios.



Brieg Lecoublet, Yvan Petit, Eric Wagnac, Dominic Boisclair, Pierre-Jean Arnoux
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 3

Cervical spine injuries are a major concern for motorcyclists in traffic accidents and racing competitions. Neck braces aim to prevent cervical spine injuries during accidents by reducing the neck range of motion, and keeping it under physiological limits. This work aims to evaluate the ability of neck braces to reduce neck mobility for two driving postures associated with PTW configurations. The neck mobility of twelve volunteer subjects testing four neck braces on two powered two-wheelers (scooter and racing motorbike) is measured using an optoelectronic motion capture system. With the tested neck braces worn, neck mobility is significantly reduced as compared to the physiological range of motion in all degrees of freedom. However, only flexion/extension is reduced by all neck braces tested. This suggests that these brace designs do not provide protection against all the cervical spine loading directions that may occur in a trauma. Furthermore, specific type of each powered two-wheeler considered significantly affects the neck mobility in axial rotation, as well as the postero-anterior and caudo-cranial translations, thus underscoring the need to consider the driving posture when evaluating neck brace devices.


Emir Ganić, Jurica Ivošević, Bojana Mirković
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 3

The aim of this research was to examine the impact of aircraft noise on communities near the Belgrade Airport by conducting short-term noise measurements. Apart from the noise abatement procedure published in the Aeronautical Information Publication for Belgrade Airport, there are still neither publicly available reports of the actual efforts made towards the aircraft noise reduction nor the description of the current noise situation. In order to estimate the current noise situation, eighteen aircraft overflight noise measurements were taken in two settlements in specific sound-sensitive community areas around the Belgrade Airport. The results showed that level differences between background noise and aircraft overflights were higher than 10 dB for each measurement and could be considered significant. Furthermore, preliminary compatibility analysis with acoustic zoning was performed. Average daily noise levels were estimated from these short-term measurements and were compared to legal noise limits for different acoustic zones. The results indicate that in some cases noise levels exceed the legal threshold, which should encourage land use planners to include the issue of Belgrade acoustic zoning on the agenda, but also prompt Belgrade Airport to implement continuous noise and flight tracks monitoring.


Fuquan Pan, Haitao Pan, Lixia Zhang, Changxi Ma, Jinshun Yang, Guoxiang Kang
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 3

Existing parking guidance systems only provide road guidance outside the parking lot but do not provide accurate guidance to specific parking spaces inside the parking lot. By using a Kalman filter, the Grubbs test, and a neural network algorithm to improve the RSSI-based location fingerprint identification technology, an accurate location method based on indoor Wi-Fi is obtained, which implements precise route guidance and a reverse search function for parking spaces. We utilize Beidou positioning to develop a Gaode map for outdoor navigation and use an integrated system of ultrasonic detector/indicators and ground locks to manage parking spaces. Through the secondary development of an Android system and the application of a MySql database, an app for precise parking guidance was developed. The system makes full use of the Internet and parking information, eliminates information asymmetry, improves the utilization ratio of the urban static traffic resources, allocates parking spaces in real-time, breaks information islands, provides parking search and recommendation functions for users, achieves parking information-sharing, and effectively improves parking efficiency and the parking utilization ratio.


Patiphan Kaewwichian
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 3

In terms of the travel demand prediction from the household car ownership model, if the imbalanced data were used to support the transportation policy via a machine learning model, it would negatively affect the algorithm training process. The data on household car ownership obtained from the study project for the expressway preparation in the Khon Kaen Province (2015) was an unbalanced dataset. In other words, the number of members of the minority class is lower than the rest of the answer classes. The result is a bias in data classification. Consequently, this research suggested balancing the datasets with cost-sensitive learning methods, including decision trees, k-nearest neighbors (kNN), and naive Bayes algorithms. Before creating the 3-class model, a k-folds cross-validation method was applied to classify the datasets to define true positive rate (TPR) for the model’s performance validation. The outcome indicated that the kNN algorithm demonstrated the best performance for the minority class data prediction compared to other algorithms. It provides TPR for rural and suburban area types, which are region types with very different imbalance ratios, before balancing the data of 46.9% and 46.4%. After balancing the data (MCN1), TPR values were 84.4% and 81.4%, respectively.


Duy Tran Quang, Sang Hoon Bae
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 3

Traffic congestion is one of the most important issues in large cities, and the overall travel speed is an important factor that reflects the traffic status on road networks. This study proposes a hybrid deep convolutional neural network (CNN) method that uses gradient descent optimization algorithms and pooling operations for predicting the short-term traffic congestion index in urban networks based on probe vehicles. First, the input data are collected by the probe vehicles to calculate the traffic congestion index (output label). Then, a CNN that uses gradient descent optimization algorithms and pooling operations is applied to enhance its performance. Finally, the proposed model is chosen on the basis of the R-squared (R2) and root mean square error (RMSE) values. In the best-case scenario, the proposed model achieved an R2 value of 98.7%. In addition, the experiments showed that the proposed model significantly outperforms other algorithms, namely the ordinary least squares (OLS), k-nearest neighbors (KNN), random forest (RF), recurrent neural network (RNN), artificial neural network (ANN), and convolutional long short-term memory (ConvLSTM), in predicting traffic congestion index. Furthermore, using the proposed method, the time-series changes in the traffic congestion status can be reliably visualized for the entire urban network.


Xia Yang, Rui Ma, Peng Yang, Xuegang Jeff Ban
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 3

Double queue concept has gained its popularity in dynamic user equilibrium (DUE) modeling because it can properly model real traffic dynamics. While directly solving such double-queue-based DUE problems is extremely challenging, an approximation scheme called first-order approximation was proposed to simplify the link travel time estimation of DUE problems in a recent study without evaluating its properties and performance. This paper focuses on directly investigating the First-In-First-Out property and the performance of the first-order approximation in link travel time estimation by designing and modeling dynamic network loading (DNL) on single-line stretch networks. After model formulation, we analyze the First-In-First-Out (FIFO) property of the first-order approximation. Then a series of numerical experiments is conducted to demonstrate the FIFO property of the first-order approximation, and to compare its performance with those using the second-order approximation, a point queue model, and the cumulative inflow and exit flow curves. The numerical results show that the first-order approximation does not guarantee FIFO and also suggest that the second-order approximation is recommended especially when the link exit flow is increasing. The study provides guidance for further study on proposing new methods to better estimate link travel times.


Yujie Huang, Hao Hu, Jinjin Chen, Lei Dai
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 3

Government subsidy is an important responsibility of fiscal expenditure in public-private partnership (PPP) projects. However, an improper subsidy strategy may cause over-compensation or under-compensation. In this research, an iteration game model combining game theory and real option is established to describe the periodic decision-making process. The strategy game model is applied to characterize the behavioral interactions between stakeholders, and the real option theory is used to predict the project performance under the influence of their decisions. Besides, two new indicators, the efficiency of fund (SE) and the total extra cost paid by the private sector (ME), are proposed to evaluate the extra project revenue caused by each unit of the subsidy and the incentive effects of the subsidy. Consequently, the preliminary results indicate that a periodic and iterative negotiations regarding the subsidy will effectively improve the efficiency of fund compared to the traditional way. The results also show that it is important for the public sector to give incentives, encouraging the private sector to make more efforts on the project, rather than merely providing fund support. Further study will focus on more detailed and complicated behaviors of stakeholders based on the model proposed in this paper.


Zuoxian Gan, Jing Liang
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 3

In this paper, smart card data collected from the Nanjing Metro over 2-hour time periods are used to characterize within- and between-day human mobility patterns within the metro network. Results show that the OD (origin to destination) flows can be characterized well by shifted power law distributions with similar exponents around 2, which reflects the fact that a few OD pairs in the system play a dominant role and undertake disproportionately large OD flow distribution. The different exponents signify heterogeneous human movement in within- and between-day ranges. In addition, we analyze the metro community structures over different time periods based on the community detection method using random walks to visualize and understand passenger movement from a spatial perspective. Normalized mutual information is used to compare community partitions over different time-intervals. The results show that the properties of human mobility during different time periods have a similar rhythm, although some nuances exist, and the community structure is usually divided according to the line distribution. This empirical study provides spatiotemporal insights into understanding urban human mobility and some potential applications for transportation management.


Asad Karišik, Sebastjan Škerlič, Robert Muha
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 3

The aim of this paper is to develop a model for estimating the urban logistics improvements potential based on success factors of intermodal urban transport. There were two aspects considered for building the urban logistics time efficiency model: achieving an improved transport capacity without purchasing new vehicles, and transferring responsibility of poor shipment planning to its owners by implementing the intermodal transport success factors. The model is to establish functional relationship among the shipment distribution requests (urbanization) and urban logistics inefficiencies management (market inconsistencies), and their impact on business operations. The applicability of the proposed model was tested on urban population growth data and time inefficiencies in urban distribution. The results provide both theoretical and practical confirmation of time efficiency importance of urban logistics and potential for introduction of new intermodal solutions in urban logistics. Different case scenarios for Sarajevo prove that reducing inefficiencies in urban logistics could reduce the number of delivery vehicles by less than a half. Since the delivery vehicles are sources of pollution, the subsequent conclusion is valid for externalities levels. The model, therefore, complements the existing knowledge and represents a practical tool for urban planners and logistics professionals for creating an efficient, innovative, and integrative approach to the development of urban logistics services.


Snežana Tadić, Milovan Kovač, Olja Čokorilo
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 3

With the rise of city logistics (CL) problems in the last three decades, various methods, approaches, solutions, and initiatives were analyzed and proposed for making logistics in urban areas more sustainable. The most analyzed and promising solutions are those that take into account cooperation among logistics providers and consolidation of the flow of goods. Furthermore, technological innovations enable the implementation of modern vehicles/equipment in order to make CL solutions sustainable. For several years, drone-based delivery has attracted lots of attention in scientific research, but there is a serious gap in the literature regarding the application of drones in CL concepts. The goal of this paper is to analyze four CL concepts that differ in consolidation type, transformation degree of flow of goods (direct and indirect, multi-echelon flows), and the role of drones. Two of the analyzed concepts are novel, which is the main contribution of the paper. The performances of the analyzed concepts are compared to the performances of the traditional delivery model – using only trucks without prior flow consolidation. The results indicate that CL concepts which combine different consolidation models and drones in the last phase of the delivery could stand out as a sustainable CL solution.


Luka Vukić, Giambattista Guidi, Tanja Poletan Jugović, Renato Oblak
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 3

Following the sustainable transport policy, environmental criteria are becoming a competitive factor within the maritime shipping industry. The use of greener fuels in internal combustion engines, including electric drive, is a measure that can reduce external costs of transport. Alternative fuels in maritime transport, benefits, and potential attainable savings have been examined on the Kamenari–Lepatane ro-ro ferry route in the Bay of Kotor located in Montenegro. The results indicate higher total fuel cost savings by switching to LNG compared with electric power. However, the external costs of the latter are considerably lower, especially using renewable energy sources rather than fossil ones in the production process. The results obtained, relative to the magnitude and assumed complete internalization of external costs, justify the incentive to use the renewable sources as energy providers on the examined ro-ro ferry route. Environmental criteria should play a decisive role in assessing the overall benefit value, under the current trends and regulations of emissions reduction in maritime transport.


Yongbin Yang, Peng Du
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 3

Traditional all-stop train operation mode cannot meet the demand of long travel distance and centralized travel of commuters very well. To meet this special travel demand, a zonal train operation mode based on “many-to-many” train stops is proposed. The coefficient of passenger exchange is used to locate suburban areas by depicting travel characteristics of commuters. Operational separating points within the suburban area are used as decision variables to analyze the combined cost components of this model, including passenger travel costs and railway operating costs. An integer programming model with the lowest overall cost is established, and the genetic algorithm is employed to solve it. The results proved good relative benefits in operation costs and travel time. And the sensitivity analysis of both coefficient of passenger exchange and passenger intensity has shown that the zonal operation mode is suitable for suburban railways with centralized travelers. However, the research also shows that when the passenger volume rose to a very high level, the number of zones would be limited by the maximized capacity of railway lines, which may cause the decline of the relative operational efficiency.


Livia Maglić, Tomislav Krljan, Neven Grubišić, Lovro Maglić
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 2

The growing demand for private and public transport services in urban areas requires sophisticated approaches to achieve satisfactory mobility standards in urban areas. Some of the main problems in urban areas today are road congestions and consequently vehicle emissions. The aim of this paper is to propose a methodological approach for the estimation of vehicle emissions. The proposed methodology is based on two interrelated models. The first model is a microscopic simulation SUMO model which can be used to identify the most congested urban areas and roads with critical values of traffic parameters. The second model is the COPERT Street Level for estimating vehicle emissions. The proposed models were tested on the urban area of Rijeka. The results of the microscopic SUMO simulation model indicate six urban roads with the critical traffic flow parameters. On the basis of the six identified urban roads, an estimation of vehicle emissions was carried out for specific time periods: 2017, 2020, 2025, and 2030. According to the results of the second model, the urban road R20-21 was identified as the most polluted road in the urban district of Rijeka. The results indicate that over the period 2017–2030, CO emissions will be reduced on average by 57% on all observed urban roads, CO2 emissions by 20%, and PM emissions by 58%, while the largest reduction of 65% will be in NOx emissions.


Mohammad Ali Sahraei, Emre Kuşkapan, Muhammed Yasin Çodur
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 2

COVID-19 caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus is a global health concern due to the quick spread of the disease. In Turkey, the first confirmed COVID-19 case and death occurred on 11 and 15 March 2020, respectively. There is a lack of research on the impact of COVID-19 on public transportation mobility and the Air Quality Index (AQI) around the world. The objective of this research is to consider the impact of COVID-19 on public transportation usage and consequently the AQI level in Turkey. Data collection for the analysis of public transportation usage and the air quality status during pre-lockdown and lockdown was carried out using the public transportation applications Moovit and World’s Air Pollution. The results demonstrated that during the lockdown in Ankara and Istanbul, public transportation usage dramatically decreased by more than 80% by the end of March and did not change significantly until the end of May. As regards air quality, the results confirmed that air quality improved significantly during the lockdown. For Ankara and Istanbul, the improvement was estimated at about 9% and 47%, respectively.


Chenyu Zhou, Xuan Zhao, Qiang Yu, Rong Huang
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 2

Coach emergency escape research is an effective measure to reduce casualties under serious vehicle fire accidents. A novel experiment method employing a wireless transducer was implemented and the head rotation speed, rotation moment and rotation duration were collected as the input variables for the classification and regression tree (CART) model. Based on this model, the classification result explicitly pointed out that the exit searching efficiency was evolving. By ignoring the last three unimportant factors from the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP), the ultimate Dynamic Bayesian Network (DBN) was built with the temporal part of the CART output and the time-independent part of the vehicle characteristics. Simulation showed that the most efficient exit searching period is the middle escape stage, which is 10 seconds after the emergency signal is triggered, and the escape probability clearly increases with the efficient exit searching. Furthermore, receiving emergency escape training contributes to a significant escape probability improvement of more than 10%. Compared with different failure modes, the emergency hammer layout and door reliability have a more significant influence on the escape probability improvement than aisle condition. Based on the simulation results, the escape probability will significantly drop below 0.55 if the emergency hammers, door, and aisle are all in a failure state.


Benedikt Badanik, Martin Janossy, Arthur Dijkstra
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 2

Improving safety has always been the top interest in the aviation industry. The outcomes of safety and risk analyses have become much more thorough and sophisticated. They have become an industry standard of safety investigations in many airlines nowadays. In the past, airlines were much more limited in answering the questions about hazardous situations, accident probabilities, and accident rates. Airlines try hard to cope with stricter safety standards. The objective of this paper is to find out and quantify the extent of the expert judgment in helping airlines in the evaluation of the Flight Data Monitoring (FDM) events. On top of that, the paper reveals the method for a careful choice of experts, so that their estimations will maximize the potential of an accurate and useful outcome. Also, the paper provides details of implementation of the classical model into this research, then continues with the calculations and visualization of the outcomes. The outcomes are probability distributions per each aircraft type, then per IATA accident type and finally per FDM event.


Xin Huang, Yimin Wang, Peiqun Lin, Heng Yu, Yue Luo
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 2

Accurate metro ridership prediction can guide passengers in efficiently selecting their departure time and simultaneously help traffic operators develop a passenger organization strategy. However, short-term passenger flow prediction needs to consider many factors, and the results of the existing models for short-term subway passenger flow forecasting are often unsatisfactory. Along this line, we propose a parallel architecture, called the seasonal and nonlinear least squares support vector machine (SN-LSSVM), to extract the periodicity and nonlinearity characteristics of passenger flow. Various forecasting models, including auto-regressive integrated moving average, long short-term memory network, and support vector machine, are employed for evaluating the performance of the proposed architecture. Moreover, we first applied the method to the Tiyu Xilu station which is the most crowded station in the Guangzhou metro. The results indicate that the proposed model can effectively make all-weather and year-round passenger flow predictions, thus contributing to the management of the station.


Tibor Sipos, Zsombor Szabó, Árpád Török
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 2

The role of cross-border commuting needs is remarkable, given that large cross-border cities tend to have high traffic attractiveness. Thus, agglomeration effects are strongly prevalent in populous settlements close to the border. This is due to the fact that both Hungary and the neighboring countries are burdened by spatial inequalities; therefore, the traffic at the individual border crossing points is unbalanced. Our aim is to show the extent to which the introduction of certain public transport modes contributes to the reduction of cross-border passenger car traffic. In order to do this, we have to set up a spatial econometric model that can simultaneously handle the parallel public transport infrastructure, the cross-border attractiveness of border cities, and the impact of spatial inequalities. The results of the research shed light on how the introduction of each means of transport contributes to increasing the competitiveness of border regions. This will demonstrate the effectiveness of policy tools that can improve the competitiveness of a given macroregion.


Huang Yan, Xiaoning Zhang, Xiaolei Wang
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 2

The rapid growth of the intercity travel demand has resulted in enormous pressure on the passenger transportation network in a megaregion area. Optimally locating hubs and allocating demands to hubs influence the effectiveness of a passenger transportation network. This study develops a hierarchical passenger hub location model considering the service availability of hierarchical hubs. A mixed integer linear programming formulation was developed to minimize the total cost of hub operation and transportation for multiple travel demands and determine the proportion of passengers that access hubs at each level. This model was implemented for the Wuhan metropolitan area in four different scenarios to illustrate the applicability of the model. Then, a sensitivity analysis was performed to assess the impact of changing key parameters on the model results. The results are compared to those of traditional models, and the findings demonstrate the importance of considering hub choice behavior in demand allocation.


Drago Pupavac, Robert Maršanić, Ljudevit Krpan
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 2

The basic aim of this paper is to research the importance of supply chain optimization in the circumstances of the COVID-19 crisis. The research object is the optimum selection of active participants before and after the COVID-19 crisis. The initial hypothesis of this paper is that optimal COVID-19-free supply chains can be formed with a dynamic programming method, the costs of which will be higher than those when this restriction would not exist, but significantly lower than those formed if the optimization principle in the selection of supply chain stakeholders would be neglected. Research results in this scientific discussion paper are based on the analysis and synthesis method, comparative method, and dynamic programming method. The main findings of this paper point to the conclusion that the COVID-19 crisis affected the reduction of goods flow within supply chains, reduction of potential participants in supply chains, reduction of supply chains business safety, and increase in business costs.


Meixian Jiang, Guoxing Wu, Jianpeng Zheng, Guanghua Wu
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 2

This paper constructs a berth-quay crane capacity planning model with the lowest average daily cost in the container terminal, and analyzes the influence of the number of berths and quay cranes on the terminal operation. The object of berth-quay crane capacity planning is to optimize the number of berths and quay cranes to maximize the benefits of the container terminal. A steady state probability transfer model based on Markov chain for container terminal is constructed by the historical time series of the queuing process. The current minimum time operation principle (MTOP) strategy is proposed to correct the state transition probability of the Markov chain due to the characteristics of the quay crane movement to change the service capacity of a single berth. The solution error is reduced from 7.03% to 0.65% compared to the queuing theory without considering the quay crane movement, which provides a basis for the accurate solution of the berth-quay crane capacity planning model. The proposed berth-quay crane capacity planning model is validated by two container terminal examples, and the results show that the model can greatly guide the container terminal berth-quay crane planning.


Junhua Guo, Yutao Ye, Yafeng Ma
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 2

Route selection and distribution costs of express delivery based on the urban metro network, referred to as metro express delivery (MeD), is addressed in this study. Considering the characteristics of express delivery transportation and the complexity of the urban metro network, three distribution modes of different time periods are proposed and a strict integrated integer linear programming model is developed to minimize total distribution costs. To effectively solve the optimal problem, a standard genetic algorithm was improved and designed. Finally, the Ningbo subway network is used as an example to confirm the practicability and effectiveness of the model and algorithm. The results show that when the distribution number of express delivery packages is 1980, the three different MeD modes can reduce transportation costs by 40.5%, 62.0%, and 59.0%, respectively. The results of the case analysis will help guide express companies to collaborate with the urban metro network and choose the corresponding delivery mode according to the number of express deliveries required.


Antonio Pratelli, Pietro Leandri, Rosaria Aiello, Reginald Roy Souleyrette
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 2

This paper describes a procedure for improving the resilience of roadway networks. A methodology is outlined that develops a time-dependent and performance-based resilience index. This methodology was applied to an Italian road, with the aim of optimizing intersections that are critical due to inadequate baseline capacity. The methodology uses a calibrated microscopic traffic model (using Aimsun™) whereby average delay at intersection approaches are estimated by an analytical model. From the simulation, average speed over time is obtained for each approach. These values in turn are used as inputs for calculating each intersection’s resilience index. The procedure allows the identification of less resilient intersections, and provides design solutions for each of them. Lastly, a safety assessment is tested for one of the intersections.


Zvonimir Rezo, Sanja Steiner, Tomislav Mihetec
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 2

Airspace fragmentation represents an issue that began to be more frequently mentioned within the Air Traffic Management (ATM) domain in the last two decades. Primarily, it is frequently listed as one of the main causes contributing to inefficiency of the ATM system in Europe. However, even though the issue of the European airspace fragmentation has been recognized back in the 1990s, over the past decades it has neither been frequently studied nor comprehensively addressed. Accordingly, minor progress has been made to describe this issue in more depth. Therefore, this research paper deals with the research of performance-based airspace fragmentation (one of several European airspace fragmentation types). It presents the conceptual and methodological framework of a novel model that can be used to obtain answers to hypothetical questions of where, when, how, and whether it is possible to achieve performance-based airspace defragmentation. Accordingly, it is expected that further studies of the developed model will deliver relevant information that may contribute to a more inclusive, smart, and spatially oriented development of the ATM system in Europe.



Mojtaba Mousazadeh Gilandeh, Sari Sharif Ali, Mohammad Javad Goodarzi, Nahid Amini, Hassan Latifi
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 1

In this study, the traffic parameters were collected from three work zones in Iran in order to evaluate the queue length in the work zones. The work zones were observed at peak and non-peak hours. The results showed that abrupt changes in Freeway Free Speed (FFS) and arrival flow rate caused shockwaves and created a bottleneck in that section of the freeway. In addition, acceleration reduction, abrupt change in the shockwave speed, abrupt change in the arrival flow rate and increase in the percentage of heavy vehicles have led to extreme queue lengths and delay. It has been found that using daily traffic data for scheduling the maintenance and rehabilitation projects could diminish the queue length and delay. Also, by determining the bypass for heavy vehicles, the delay can be significantly reduced; by more than three times. Finally, three models have been presented for estimating the queue length in freeway work zones. Moreover, the procedure shown for creating a queue length model can be used for similar freeways.


Duo Xu, Xu, Duo , , Huijun Sun
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 1

Parking problems are getting increasingly serious in the urban area. However, the parking spots in the urban area are underutilized rather than really scarce. There is a large number of private spots in the residential areas that have the potential of being shared. Due to its private nature, shared parking is usually operated by a profitable mode. To study the utilization of shared parking and its impact on the morning commute, this paper proposes an evolution model. The supply side is a profit-chasing manager who decides on the selling prices and the business scale, while the demand side refers to travellers who respond to costs and choose the trip mode. By analysing the behaviour (strategy) of both sides, the study covers: 1 - the attraction and competition between parking lots and trip modes, 2 - the utilization and user composition of the parking lots. By inducing two numerical examples, the conclusions are that 1 - managers can achieve maximum profit and optimal allocation through price adjustment and quantity control; 2 - publicity (system cost minimization) and profitability (profit maximization) are consistent under certain threshold conditions; 3 - competition exists between parking lots as well as trip modes; some parking lots are even in short supply; profitable management does not create a market monopoly.


Linbo Li, Mengfei Cao, Jiajun Yin, Yanli Wang, Yahua Zhang
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 1

This study explores the spatial distribution characteristics of travel activities and their relationship with land use, using data from the resident travel survey in 2015 of Xiaoshan District of Hangzhou City, China. A new classification method is proposed to classify the travel activity patterns into three groups: single-activity travel, multi-activity intermittent travel, and multi-activity continuous travel. The main findings are: (a) the length of activity chain and the proportion of multi-activity travels increase with the distance between residence and activity centre; (b) the non-home destinations of single-activity travel, multi-activity intermittent travel and multi-activity continuous travel agglomerate towards the activity centre, and the degree of agglomeration increases in this order; (c) the distribution density of Point Of Interest (POI) and activity destinations have strong positive correlations in space; (d) some attributes of POIs and demographics have significant influence on multi-activity continuous travels. These findings are useful in inducing the activities through reasonable combinations and spatial interconnections of POIs in urban planning.


Jaromír Široký, Petr Nachtigall, Jozef Gašparík, Jiří Čáp
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 1

This paper presents a pricing model of railway infrastructure capacity allocation functioning as a regulatory measure while fulfilling the regulatory requirements on railway infrastructure capacity allocation. The prices of railway infrastructure capacity allocation will be modelled with regard to all economically justifiable costs of railway infrastructure capacity allocation. The structure of model has been developed as a set of calculation sheets in Microsoft Excel. The recommended prices for railway capacity have been found by simulation of a set of variants and the recommendation is done for different operational conditions in an individual way. It analyses different products offered by the railway infrastructure capacity allocator both in the annual working timetable mode, and in the individual ad hoc mode. The aim of the proposed model is to motivate not only railway undertakings, but also the railway infrastructure capacity allocator to submit requests for railway infrastructure capacity in the annual working timetable mode rather than in the individual ad hoc mode. The total price is then verified to the cost of railway infrastructure capacity allocation. This process then ensures the regulation of the demand of railway undertakings on the given route and can influence the decision about the use of the product offered.


Mirjana Grdinić-Rakonjac, Boris Antić, Dalibor Pešić, Vladimir Pajković
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 1

Aggregation of different variables into one road safety performance index is a popular concept in evaluating road safety and comparing the performance of territories/entities. This paper presents the development of a novel and innovative weighting methodology using grey relational analysis. Based on the proposed model, ten hierarchical road safety indicators were selected in terms of a two-layered model with three categories related to behaviour, safety and system. Grey weights are assigned to the categorized indicators in each layer, and the grey road safety composite indicator for each entity (21 selected territories) is calculated by the weighted sum approach. With relatively high weights, this systematic methodology can serve the policy makers in targeting the risk domains where improvements are needed. The results clearly illustrate effectiveness in addressing a large number of indicators with hierarchical structures.


Yijing Yang, Xu Wu, Haonan Li
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 1

This paper proposes a collaborative optimization model of car-flow organization for freight trains based on adjacent technical stations to minimize the average dwell time of train cars in a yard. To solve the car-flow organization problems, a priority-based hump sequence, which depends on the cars available in two adjacent technical stations, is adopted. Furthermore, a meta-heuristic algorithm based on the genetic algorithm and the taboo search algorithm is adopted to solve the model, and the introduction of the active scheduling method improves the efficiency of the algorithm. Finally, the model is applied to the car-flow organization problem of two adjacent technical stations, and the results are compared with those from a single technical station without collaboration. The results demonstrate that collaborative car-flow organization between technical stations significantly reduces the average dwell time at the stations, thereby improving the utilization rate of railroad equipment. In addition, the results indicate that the hybrid genetic algorithm can rapidly determine the train hump and marshalling schemes.


Jamil Hamadneh, Domokos Esztergár-Kiss
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 1

Autonomous Vehicles (AVs) have been designed to make changes in the travel behaviour of travellers. These changes can be interpreted using transport models and simulation tools. In this study, the daily activity plans were used to study the possibility of increasing the utility of travellers through minimizing the travel time by using AVs. Three groups of travellers were selected based on the benefits that they can obtain when AVs are on the market. The groups are (a) long-trip travellers (b) public transport riders, and (c) travellers with specified characteristics. Each group is divided into one or more scenarios based on the definition of each group and the collected data. A total of seven scenarios were derived from the collected data and simulated twice to include the existing transport modes and the presence of AVs. The simulations were conducted using Multi-Agents Transport Simulation (MATSim) that applies the concept of a co-evolutionary algorithm. MATSim simulates the current plans and the ones where AVs replace all or part of the existing conventional transport modes in the daily activity plans. The results have shown a reduction in the trip time: 13% to 42% for group (a), 33% for group (b), and 16% to 28% for group (c) compared with the original trip times. In conclusion, it can be claimed that AVs could reduce the travel time in all cases, which provides benefits for people to increase their utilities.


Ermin Muharemović, Samir Čaušević, Amel Kosovac, Jasmina Baraković Husić
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 1

The present review paper provides a systematic insight into the studies published so far when it comes to the research on the cost and performance optimisation in the parcel delivery phase. Globalisation, as well as the new trends, such as selling online, directly influences the demands for the delivery of goods. Demand for the delivery of goods proportionally affects the transport prices. A great majority of deliveries is carried out in densely populated urban areas. In terms of costs, the greatest part in the courier organisations costs is observed in the technological phase of parcel delivery, which is at the same time the least efficient. For that reason, significant improvement of performance and cost optimisation in the very delivery phase is a rather challenging field for the researchers. New algorithm-based technologies, innovations in the logistics and outsourcing of individual technological phases are ways by means of which one strives to enhance the delivery efficiency, to improve performance and quality, but also - to optimise the costs in the last phase of delivery. The aim of the present paper is to offer a systematic review into the most recent research in the field of technology, innovations and outsourcing models with the aim of reducing the cost and enhancing the productivity and quality in parcel delivery.


Guang Yuan, Dewen Kong, Lishan Sun, Wei Luo, Yan Xu
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 1

With the rapid development of urbanization in China, the number of travel modes and urban passenger transportation hubs has been increasing, gradually forming multi-level and multi-attribute transport hub networks in the cities. At the same time, Super Network Theory (SNT) has advantages in displaying the multi-layer transport hubs. The aim of this paper is to provide a new perspective to study connectivity contribution of potential hubs. Urban transport hubs are ranked through topological features based on Hub Super Network (HSN). This paper proposes two indexes based on Super-Edge (SE), Zero Hub Degree of SE (ZHDoSE) and a number of shared SEes (NSSE), respectively. Then, a case study was conducted in Beijing, which considers four combinations to study the influence of transport modes and subway lines on connectivity. The results show that no-normalization strengthens the contribution of transport modes and subway lines on connectivity. Besides, the transport mode contributes a lot to the connectivity. However, elements normalization strengthens the subway lines under ZHDoSE reciprocal. In addition, various weights of ZHDoSE and NSSE have different influences on the recognition results of SEes in HSN.

 


Marko Špoljarec, Robert Manger
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 1

This paper deals with robust optimization and network flows. Several robust variants of integer flow problems are considered. They assume uncertainty of network arc capacities as well as of arc unit costs (where applicable). Uncertainty is expressed by discrete scenarios. Since the considered variants of the maximum flow problem are easy to solve, the paper is mostly concerned with NP-hard variants of the minimum-cost flow problem, thus proposing an approximate algorithm for their solution. The accuracy of the proposed algorithm is verified by experiments.


Ruochen Hao, Ling Wang, Wanjing Ma, Chunhui Yu
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 1

The Signal Phase and Timing (SPaT) message is an important input for research and applications of Connected Vehicles (CVs). However, the actuated signal controllers are not able to directly give the SPaT information since the SPaT is influenced by both signal control logic and real-time traffic demand. This study elaborates an estimation method which is proposed according to the idea that an actuated signal controller would provide similar signal timing for similar traffic states. Thus, the quantitative description of traffic states is important. The traffic flow at each approaching lane has been compared to fluids. The state of fluids can be indicated by state parameters, e.g. speed or height, and its energy, which includes kinetic energy and potential energy. Similar to the fluids, this paper has proposed an energy model for traffic flow, and it has also added the queue length as an additional state parameter. Based on that, the traffic state of intersections can be descripted. Then, a pattern recognition algorithm was developed to identify the most similar historical states and also their corresponding SPaTs, whose average is the estimated SPaT of this second. The result shows that the average error is 3.1 seconds.


Matea Mikulčić, Tomislav Josip Mlinarić
2021 (Vol 33), Issue 1

In times of ever stronger awareness of environmental protection and potentiation of a beneficial modal split, the railway sector with efficient asset utilization and proper investment planning has the highest chance of meeting customer expectations and attracting new users more effectively. Continuous increase in railway demand leads to an increase in the utilization of railway infrastructure, and the inevitable lack of capacity, a burning problem that many national railways are continually facing. To address it more effectively, this paper reviews available methodologies for railway capacity determination and techniques for its enhancement in the recent scientific literature. Particular focus is given to the possibility of increasing railway capacity through signalling systems and installing the European Train Control System (ETCS). The most important relationships with segments of existing research have been identified, and in line with this, the directions for a potential continuation of research are suggested.


Published by
University of Zagreb, Faculty of Transport and Traffic Sciences
Online ISSN
1848-4069
Print ISSN
0353-5320
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