Specifics of Creating a Public Transport Demand Model for Low-Density Regions: Lithuanian Case

Abstract

A transport model usually consists of a demand model and an available transport network model. The purpose of this article is to identify the key specifics for the development of a regional public transport (PT) demand model and to point out the differences from the urban PT demand model. The traditional four-step transport planning demand model consists of trip generation, trip distribution, modal split, and assignment. This article consists of PT model development, calibration, and validation. A PTV VISUM macroscopic modeling program is used for this research. As a result, this article presents basic suggestions for how a PT demand model should be developed in regions. The presented suggestions for developing a PT demand model can be applied to any low-density region. The rest of the article is structured as follows: (1) Background: presents a literature analysis of the four-step model, modal splits, and the features of the PTV VISUM program; (2) Methods: describes the considered region of Lithuania and the data of the developed model; describes the four-step model, which is adapted to the Lithuanian region; (3) Results: presents the results and main suggestions for creating a PT demand model; and (4) Conclusions: presents the main conclusions of the study.