Monitoring, Assessing and Forcasting Trips in the Paris District

Copyright © IFAC Transportation Systems, Tianjin, PRC, 1994

MONITORING, ASSESSING AND FORCASTING TRIPS IN THE PARIS DISTRICT J.ROUSSET Synaicat Transpons Parisiells,9-11,Avenuede Villars, 7500 7Paris , Fran ce Abstract:Today's realities and feture directions for transport in metropolitan Paris . The contribution of modem infonnation,observation,evaluation and forecasting technologies. Key Words. Transport; quality of service; mapping; models, networks, public transport., roads, information.

Short term : increasing failures and travellers' growing insistence on quality of service call for immediate measures which need scheduling and evaluating.

The Syndicat des Transports Pari si ens is the public transport organizing authority for France's capital area, Ile-de-France.

It is this twin conceptual and operational concern which, in recent years, has led the STP to develop a certain number of approaches which are summarized in this paper.

It is a public national body with equal involvement by the State (12 administrators notably representing the Ministries of Transport, of the Interior and of Finance, ... ) and the 8 departments with 12 elected representatives chosen by the local assemblies as constituted by the Conseils Generaux.

1. TRANSPORT PROBLEMS IN ILE-DEFRANCE

The Board of Directors is chaired ex officio by the Prefet de Region who represents the government in Ile-de-France. The Vice-Chairman and author of this paper is appointed by the government and is also Managing Director in charge of the Syndicat's activities.

Planning and operations for lle-de-France present complex problems which in (1989) led the government to undertake a major planning process which should soon (i.e. 5 years later) culminate in new regional planning and development guidelines.

In the event of a hung vote, the Chairman has the casting vote. This means that., where necessary, the State has the last word.

In parallel, in view of the essential role played by transport, the STP's Vice-Chairman was asked to develop a "Strategic Travel Plan". The final report, submitted in Autumn 1992, produced the following diagnosis :

This said, what is the nature of the transport problem in Ile-de-France ?

- a worrying growth in car congestion in the central city area which necessitates control measures for private car use to provide a better balance in the share of road space between private and public transport vehicles, regulatory and financial parking disincentives, and possibly city tolls;

With 10.6 million inhabitants and 21 million daily car commuters, lIe-de-France is one of the world's largest conurbations. A major issue both for the population's quality of life and for business development., transport organization presents fonnidable long tenn as well as short tenn problems.

- but these measures will only be effective if public transport is, at the same time, made more attractive both from the quantitative (network development) and the qualitative (improved service) point of view.

Long term : given the unwieldiness of the transport system and its tendency to lag, a permanently forward looking approach needs to be maintained, which involves access to the appropriate instruments.

As regards network development., the emphasis will be mainly on building inner (ORBITALE plan) and outer orbital by-passes between the urban centres as represented notably by the 5 new

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towns, as it is suburb to suburb travel that is growing the fastest and that has the poorest public transport provision. - All surveys show that quality of service is the main criterion on which users base their choice of transport mode. While cars become more luxurious from one year to the next with equipment such as mobile phones, route finding, air conditioning, public transport still leaves much to be desired : travellers tell us what they require in tenns of reliability, safety, cleanliness, but also in tenns of information and comprehensibility. Without an active policy to improve quality, it is likely that public transport's market share will go on falling.

- Of course, a transport policy needs to be backed up with appropriate financial (from the organizing body, from tariffs, ... ) and institutional resources. Only one point will be emphasised here : travellers want to get from departure to arrival in good conditions whatever means of transport they use. They are looking for an integrated service from one end of their journey to the other.

This is how the STP came to undertake two original and targeted projects, the first on static route infonnation, the second on dynamic integrated information.

2.1. Directions and static information About one hundred operators are involved, to which one has to add the local authorities who display final route maps in public areas. All these agents juxtapose their various directions and multiple logos and travellers have a lot of trouble finding their bearings. To help them, the STP and its partners have developed a common vocabulary. After tests carried out on a few experimental sites, this semantic research has led to a standard set of specifications with which all constructors have to comply. At the same time, a standard maintenance and update agreement has been developed. The results achieved with the first constructions are highly positive. The objective now is to extend the approach to any renovation or construction of bus stations or bus stops.

This interdependence of transport methods also emerges very clearly when it comes to arbitration in investment budgets between road and rail or when tariffs are set : - metro ticket, motorway tolls, parking costs, ...

In parallel with this approach, two new research areas have been investigated :

In other words, the whole transport system has to be perceived as an integrated whole.

- in integrated transport spaces, information to drivers about train arrivals to provide better connections.

Moreover, while the quality of service requirement emphasised here calls for immediate action, the massiveness of the system also necessitates a long term approach, with measures based on permanent observation and evaluation. This is the background to the presentation here of a few innovative operations carried out by the STP since 1989-1990 in relation to 3 objectives : - information - observation and assessment - preparation.

2. INFORMATION One of the main requirements of travellers is that routes should be available and infonnation about them easy to understand.

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- real time travel information in bus stations about bus departures,

2.2. Dynamic Integrated Information This operation is part of the projects subsidised by the European Union (DRIVE programmes) and takes the following fonn : after a summary of the current situation, of needs and expectations, research and development led to a definition of the system, designed in parallel with the SIRIUS and CARMINAT road information experiments undertaken by the Region and the State to integrate the multi-transport dimension : - on-board information about rail timetables and routes with regular update ; - real time radio transmission of data on business of a connection fleet; - real time radio transmission of data about serious problems on rail network lines.

A pilot study is currently in progress, notably looking in detail at :

- An updated inventory of bus traffic black spots. With help from its partners, the RTO has published an atlas of black spots : the data collected are firstly entered in a database and then mapped at variable scales.

- the ergonomics of the on-board system, - the design of software required for real time data transmission, for the search for information requested by users and representation of this information on the terminal .

This work has led to the setting up of improvement projects such as redesigning junctions, creating clean sites ...

Finally, a major study is in progress on the design of the evaluation project so as to record and then analyse the behaviour of trial-users.

- Mapping activities based on a powerful geographical data system. This can be used to view total transport provision and traffic flows .

All this constitutes a series of innovative studies designed to improve public transport information which will be immediately available to users (car users) who are often the least well informed about public transport alternatives.

This system includes map and text data covering the whole I1e-de-France region and constitutes a support for decision and a basis for study and travel information. A first map of the whole regional transport network has been published and widely distributed. These data will be regularly updated with the support of the transport companies.

3. OBSERVATION AND EVALUATION 3. 1. Regional Travel Observatory (RTO) : The need for an instrument for the observation and evaluation of travel policy emerged against the background of the Strategic Travel Plan. This is how, in (1990), the regional travel observatory (RTO) project came into being.

- Specific studies in progress which will help : provide a better understanding, on the basis of the global study (EGT 91), of travel patterns for certain categories of passenger (women, the unemployed, the elderly, students ...) ; perceive migratory travel flows between several areas in the region or within the Bassin Parisien ; better anticipate the travel needs of the region's population in the future.

Its design was governed by two basic principles : - integration : the RTO takes all forms of transport into account, - partnership : numerous data are available from certain operators or on smaller geographical levels. It is not a question of reinventing them, but federating them, combining and completing them so as to culminate in an information system common to all participants, comprising a battery of quantitative and qualitative indicators by which the transport system can be described and its evolution followed.

The partnership aspect is visible in the way the project is directed on the basis of a so-called "CONCORDE" permanent steering committee and a budget jointly and more or less equally financed by the STP and its partners.

3.2. The Regional Transport Account Four years after its launch, the observatory has practically reached cruising speed. Here are some examples of services and products it offers its "clients".

On top of the observatory which essentially follows technical indicators, there exists another instnunent focused on economic and financial factors : the regional transport account. This is an information tool for the public authorities designed to evaluate and assemble accessible and coherent data on monetary flows and physical realities, as well as measuring the economic and social efficiency of different means of transport.

Since (1991), the observatory has been testing the views of the population of Ile-de-France on its transport network by setting up image and satisfaction barometers, essential support elements for the quality of service policy. These measuring instruments form the basis of analyses contrasted according to age, area, transport type, and have highlighted expectations with regard to themes such as cleanliness in the metro, the slowness of buses, travel information.. .

The transport account : - examines the different economic acuVlues, whether of a commercial nature or on their own behalf. which are directly involved in passenger transport . : public or specialized transport, private transport... - specifies the nature of linked activities required for the operation of the transport system, such as highways, traffic police, car parks ...

Each annual barometer can be rounded off with specific questions (pollutions, reasons for choosing a method of transport, connections, fraud, tariffs, airport access, etc). 48 1

- identifies the direct or indirect beneficiaries of the transport sector.

It will be easy to use and operate : the models will be designed for rapid and easy analysis. For this purpose, the software environment will offer broad graphic representation possibilities.

It then collates these data into elements relating to :

The analysis the STP has sought to develop functions by decomposition, defined according to microeconomic based systems.

=> the flows of money associated with the transport system through an allocation of the contribution of different finance sources to each aspect of the domain,

There are multiple advantages to modern decomposition approaches:

=> the changes in these flows over time in relation to various non financial indicators (service, traffic ...).

- they can measure and model the consequences of different policies, genuinely behavioural models that coherently link different aspects of behaviour (from the level of car use, via the frequency of travel, to the choice of means, destination and time of travel). They are based on a theory of mobility behaviour which translates into a mathematical formulation of the model which facilitates interpretation of the results and later developments of the instrument.

This process reveals : - the finance supplied by the public providers, - the social advantages and costs of the different modes of transport : improved access, time lost or gained, noise, pollution, accidents, use of space.. .

These models are adapted to the specific characteristics of the population and the cultural

- a comparison of the monetary and non-monetary costs of the different forms of transport, including the type of link and the purpose of the journey.

habits of the application area. so they require careful development over a sufficiently long period in order to bring the best results.

In addition, by introducing the notion of "screenaccount", this process enables an the institutional financiers (State and regional authorities) to assess not only their spending (itemized under the heading of finance provided by public providers), but also the sums they receive (taxes and duties) in respect of transport activity in Ile-de-France.

CONCLUSIONS Information, observation, evaluation and preparation are the essential conditions of dialogue and the necessary public debate in the area of transport policy and action.

4. PREPARATION

As is shown by the STP's experience in Ile-deFrance, modern technology can be used to construct the necessary instruments.

To maintain the forward looking approach initiated by the Strategic Travel Plan, the observation methods just described should be rounded of with a modern forecasting instrument That is why, in (1991), STP launched the development of a global simulation model which is designed to be inclusive and fast reacting.

But partnership is a methodological imperative which is at least as important to the success of the approach. That is one of the significant factors to have emerged from the Ile-de-France experience.

The STP has two types of requirement with regard to traffic forecasting : - firstly, there is a need to be able to evaluate the consequence of the creation or redesigning of public transport infrastructure, as well as the consequences of the development of road networks; - secondly, the STP is interested in using this instrument in relation to the testing of transport policies. The instrument developed will integrate the forms of transport so that analysis can be carried out on a global level incorporating both road and public transport. 482