Transport accessibility changes in metropolitan regions: high-speed rail connection frequency estimation

Abstract

This article focuses on a very narrowly specific segment of this issue, considering the impacts of HSR in the long term, not as transport arteries connecting the most important metropolitan areas but, on the contrary, as an internal factor of development within a metropolitan region. The paper aims to transfer the present operational European HSR commuting connection frequency experience to a generally applicable frequency estimation formula. Through a quantitative approach, the research analyses the total sample of 1,446 train connections from 10 European metropolitan regions. It answers the secondary research question of what the range of accessibility change between the metropolitan core and the intermediate city is after introducing HSR connection inside metropolitan regions in the time of 1 hour of journey. The estimation model formula calculates the optimal number of HSR connections between the metropolitan core and intermediate city in the HSR developing countries. It is derived and verified from the analysed dataset values. The potential operational change scenarios are presented and described based on the example of 34 metropolitan city pairs.