Improving Public Transit Fare System: A Case Study for TransLink Fare System in Metro Vancouver

Authors

  • Jenny Hung
  • Bonnie Lo
  • Fanli Si

Abstract

This paper studies the effect on ridership based on changes in fare prices, and estimates the aggregate net transit-sourced revenue for TransLink, the regional transportation authority of Metro Vancouver. Our analysis is based on a model of historical transit demand that considers both fare elasticity and the issue of fairness based on distance travelled. The fare price adjustment problem is formulated as a deterministic integer programming model, and is solved using Excel. We 1nd that a 10% increase in the cash fares but a 10% reduction in fares for passes and store values can increase the ridership by 1.2%. This increased ridership has a positive net impact on TransLink’s operation after considering savings on traffic congestion, and overall allows TransLink to be more cost-effective.

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Published

2017-06-07

Issue

Section

Articles