Where’s the Bus? Examining Factors Correlated with High and Low Public Transit On-Time Performance

An important aspect of public bus transit is its reliability of being on-time, which has a major impact on bus ridership. Currently, there is no unified national standard to measure bus on-time performance in the United States. This paper proposes a novel approach to improve the on-time performance (OTP) of buses at transit agencies throughout the country, based on factors unique to each agency. In this study, information on 18 public transit agencies data were obtained from the National Transit Database and were verified by the authors after contacting the respective agencies. A correlation analysis was conducted to evaluate the influence of different factors on bus OTP. The results show that a higher “congestion ranking” of the cities, that is, lesser traffic, has a positive correlation with OTP, while a lower number of passengers per hour has a negative correlation with OTP, both at a 95% confidence interval. “Total miles per active vehicle” and “average speed” of the bus were found to have a positive correlation with OTP at a 90% confidence interval. This potentially suggests that, if the average speed of the bus is higher, that is, if the bus operates at its scheduled speed, total miles per active vehicle will increase, which will in turn lead to a better on-time performance. A flow diagram interpreting the results of the correlation analysis was shown, where the main bus service process was considered and the predecessors and successors which could potentially affect the final OTP were determined.

• Record URL:
  https://doi.org/10.1061/9780784484883.053
• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/isbn/9780784484883
• Supplemental Notes:
  • © 2023 American Society of Civil Engineers.
• Corporate Authors:

  American Society of Civil Engineers

  1801 Alexander Bell Drive
  Reston, VA  United States  20191-4400
• Authors:
  • Banerjee, Snehanshu
  • Jabehdari, Mohammadreza
  • Turlington, Ross
  • Greene, Cole
• Conference:
  • International Conference on Transportation and Development 2023
  • Location: Austin Texas, United States
  • Date: 2023-6-14 to 2023-6-17
• Publication Date: 2023

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Web
• Features: References;
• Pagination: pp 612-626
• Monograph Title: International Conference on Transportation and Development 2023: Transportation Planning, Operations, and Transit

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Bus transit; Bus transit operations; Level of service; On time performance; Ridership; Urban transit
• Geographic Terms: United States
• Subject Areas: Highways; Operations and Traffic Management; Planning and Forecasting; Public Transportation;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01887237
• Record Type: Publication
• ISBN: 9780784484883
• Files: TRIS, ASCE
• Created Date: Jul 13 2023 9:37AM