The primary issue addressed in this study focuses on challenges associated with urban transportation in metropolitan areas, involving major problems such as traffic congestion, inefficient energy resource consumption, and time loss. The study aims to address these issues by supporting multi-modal urban transportation systems through integration of intermediate modes.
The main objective is to develop a planning, modeling, and simulation-based framework for demand-responsive mobility systems as part of sustainable transport planning, intended to serve both decision-makers and operators. Specifically, the study targets the planning and performance evaluation of demand-responsive mobility systems, which act as complementary modes to rail transit systems and/or entire transit system.
The project foresees the increasing integration of shared-use and electric vehicles and the anticipated rise in autonomous, demand-responsive mobility systems. The role of such systems in guiding transportation policies and enabling effective planning approaches will be sought through frameworks and methodologies developed within the study.
Key innovations of this project include improving the general performance of demand-responsive mobility systems, developing mathematical formulations to model these systems, integrating congestion sensitivity, and solving associated optimization problems. The proposed framework will be tested on commonly used test networks and real-world scenarios, including a case study of Istanbul’s Historical Peninsula as a low-emission zone. Microscopic simulation, analytical car-following models, routing algorithms, optimization-based routing approaches, macroscopic traffic flow models, solvers, and various heuristic algorithms will be used. Relationships between urban mobility, urban traffic flow dynamics, the operational performance of demand-responsive mobility systems, and their interactions with public transit systems will be evaluated through scenario-based analyses.
The ongoing project, with contributions from ITU ITS Research Lab and Koc University Department of Industrial Engineering ( https://goodmobility.ku.edu.tr/), aims to provide extensive insights into urban transportation dynamics. The project outcomes can be accessed via http://its.itu.edu.tr/publications.