Ticketing and Crowd Management System for Attraction Facilities: An Aquarium Case Study

Abstract

In tourist facilities, managing ticket sales can reduce congestion imbalances. This study reports on the results of a pilot experiment conducted at Kaiyukan in Osaka, one of the largest aquariums in Japan. The experiment utilized pre-sale ticket data for controlling admission time intervals, smoothing the number of admissions through dynamic pricing, and predicting visitor numbers. The study reviewed the effectiveness of each of these approaches to alleviate congestion inside Kaiyukan. We then report on a method to predict the number of visitors from the pre-sale conditions of Kaiyukan admission tickets. It was found that setting entry times to 15-minute intervals was most operationally advantageous for the Kaiyukan. Moreover, the behavioral effects induced by variable pricing were more effective when prices were changed based on time slots rather than on a daily basis. Compared to the Holt–Winters’ method, we were able to maintain stable prediction accuracy even during consecutive holidays and long school vacation seasons.