Use of Journey Levels for
Hierarchical Transit
Assignment
Ilan Elgar
Model City Portland, September 20, 2016
Journey Level Assignment (JLA)
 A new INRO module for assigning transit trips
 Useful for transit networks with complicated fare
strategies
 Useful for hierarchical transit assignment
Metro Vancouver
Transit Commute Patterns
Transit Discretionary Patterns
Transit Network
Transit Network (in the model)
Model Formulation
 Trip based model
 The mode choice model generates separate bus and RT O-D
tables
 In the assignment stage bus and RT are treated hierarchically
Problem
How to prevent trips in the RT
assignment from using bus only?
Option 1 – Use Penalties
 Costs in the rapid transit assignment
Time Component
Calculation (min)
Perception (weight)
Waiting
1/2 Headway
2.25
Walking
Walking Speed (4.8kph)
1.75
In-Vehicle (Bus)
Bus Travel Time
3.5
In-Vehicle (RT)
RT Travel Time
1
Boarding
1 Minute
4
 The ‘3.5’ bus IVTT factor ensures that RT trips actually
use RT in the assignment stage.
 Use of the ‘3.5’ allowed calibration of the model at a
regional scale
Issues with Using Penalties
 But, at a local level the factor skewed network costs
and generated counterintuitive paths
1.5M
Option 2 – Use JLA
 The Journey Levels Assignment is a new tool added to
EMME with version 4.2 (2015)
 JLA only allows paths that meet certain Journey criteria
 Trips are essentially tagged as RT trips
 The JLA does not allow RT trips to end until a RT
segment is used
 Costs in rapid transit assignment
Time Component
Calculation (min)
Perception (weight)
Waiting
1/2 Headway
2.25
Walking
Walking Speed (4.8kph)
1.75
In-Vehicle
Transit Travel Time
1
Boarding
1 Minute
4
JLA - Testing
 JLA by itself produces counterintuitive results
JLA - Testing
Solution
 Choice-set procedure in mode choice model needs to
be tightened to filter out nonsensical RT use
 Hybrid JLA procedure using filtering criteria
 Assign RT trips using the 3.5 factor
 Filter out O-D pairs that should not have RT
availability
 Reassign the remaining O-Ds using JLA to generate
paths and costs
Outcomes of Hybrid Approach
 Results relatively stable with improved paths
Outcomes of Hybrid Approach
 Bus usage (as access mode) increases
 Walk time access decreases
JLA Future Directions
 Improve choice-set definition
 Max ratio of time spent on bus vs RT
 Max amount of time spent on bus
 RT trip time <1.5 Bus time
 Use of JLA for complicated fare schemes