Routing and congestion in multi-modal transportation networks

Abstract

With the increasing complexity and demand for transportation networks, effective routing planning has attracted more and more attention. Different modes of transportation, such as the airplane, railway and so on, work together, forming a multi-modal transportation network. Therefore, this paper studies the routing and congestion problems in the multi-modal transportation network, and shows how to increase the network capacity as much as possible while saving time and economic costs, so as to avoid congestion and realize the effective use of different modes of transportation. This paper simulates the influence of two main factors on the network capacity, the parameter which shows the importance between time costs and economic costs, and the difference between different transportation modes. The results show the change of the network capacity when the time cost and economic cost are of different importance. There exists a critical point that can balance time costs and economic costs, so as to maximize network capacity. Then this paper further finds out the method of estimating the condition when the network takes the maximum capacity through theoretical analysis.