The Need of E-ticket to Support the Public Bus Service Improvement Policy in a Developing Country

Background: Public buses are a major transportation mode in large cities in the developing country Indonesia. Nevertheless, most societies still use passenger cars. Therefore, the road authority has developed an important policy to improve public bus services soon. One of the public bus services is to change the bus operational system, including the manual ticketing system to an electronic ticket (e-ticket) system. In order to make the policy succeed, the road authority should ask for passengers’ opinions. Objective: The purposes of this study are to ensure that the bus e-ticket is needed to support the policy and then to determine important priority factors of bus e-ticket implementation. Methods: The data were collected using a direct survey with a questionnaire in large cities, Surabaya and Denpasar in Indonesia. A total of 565 bus passengers participated in this survey. An analysis was conducted through cross tabulation between the respondents’ demographic data and their perceived level of need and priority of implementation with regard to various factors of the e-ticket system. The Simple Additive Weighting method was used to determine the important priority factors. Results: Results indicated that a bus e-ticket needed for the cross tabulation average value is more than 3.60 out of 5.00 for all factors. Furthermore, the three highest values of factors based on the Simple Additive Weighting method are ease of access, availability of the bus routes information, and affordability of the e-ticket price. Conclusion: Since respondents indicate that the e-ticket is needed and is a priority, then the policy is beneficial not only to improve bus services in Indonesia but also in other developing countries with similar traffic and geometric conditions.

MAN trolleybuses in Ukraine (1939–1951): a history, technical characteristics, features of operation

The growth of the vehicle assets and bus services in Ukrainian cities increases the level of environmental pollution. During the environmental crisis, electric transport (e-transport) is becoming a matter for scientific inquiry, a subject of discussion in politics and among public figures. In the program for developing the municipal services of Ukraine, priorities are given to the development of the infrastructure of ecological transport: trolleybuses, electric buses, electric cars. The increased attention to e-transport on the part of the scientific community, politicians, and the public actualizes the study of its history, development, features of operation, etc. The historiographic analysis carried out by the authors allows us to say about insufficient coverage by Ukrainian researchers of a number of aspects and periods in the history of e-transport. A small number of special works on the history of the operation of foreign-made trolleybuses in Ukrainian cities in the first half of the 20th century and an analysis of their technical characteristics determine the relevance and scientific novelty of this study. When writing the work, Ukrainian and foreign scientific reference publications, monographs, papers, mainly from foreign electronic resources, have been used. The authors have used both general scientific (analysis, synthesis, deduction, induction) and historical research methods, in particular, problem-chronological, comparative-historical, retrospective methods, etc. The aim of the study is to highlight little-known facts of the history of production and operation of MAN trolleybuses in Ukrainian cities, as well as to introduce their technical characteristics into scientific circulation. The etymology of the model names of German trolleybuses, which usually consisted of the names of the manufacturers of chassis, body, and electrical equipment, has been clarified. The types, specific design solutions of the first MAN trolleybus generation and the prerequisites for their appearance in Chernivtsi have been determined. Particular attention has been paid to trolleybuses that were in operation in Germany and other Western European countries from the first half of the 1930s to the early 1950s. In the mid-1930s, the MAN plant in Nuremberg began production of trolleybuses; its models had the most modern constructive solutions at that time, a characteristic design and a state-of-the-art heating system. Depending on the length, German manufacturers divided the trolleybus models into four types. As a result of problems with the operation of the bus fleet in Chernivtsi, the city authorities have decided to build a trolleybus line in the city; four trolleybuses manufactured by the MAN plant were purchased. The paper traces the stages of operation of the MAN trolleybuses in Chernivtsi, where they worked during 1939–1944 and after the end of the Second World War, they were transferred to Kyiv. After two years of operation in the Ukrainian capital, the trolleybuses entered the routes in Dnipropetrovsk during 1947–1951. The technical characteristics of the first MAN trolleybus generation, which were operated in Ukrainian cities, have been presented and analyzed. It was determined that in all the main indicators and operational parameters, they were as close as possible to similar models of German trolleybuses. The proposed methodology and the structure of the study can later be used to write papers on the history of science and technology, in particular, of an e-transport.

Co-creating Sustainable Urban Mobility Solutions for Guests and Citizens: The Experience in the Elba Island

This chapter illustrates a co-creation approach engaging stakeholders and citizens to develop a shared agenda of sustainable transport solutions, responding to travel needs which are qualitatively and quantitatively different for residents and tourists. The chapter is articulated in three sections. The first section illustrates the co-creation approach and the topics addressed in all six DESTINATIONS demonstration sites where this approach has been used to a greater or lesser extent. The second section describes more extensively the application of the co-creation approach in the Elba island case, illustrating the process and its main outcomes, including the definition of a strategic agenda of goals and actions included in a draft Sustainable Mobility Plan for the whole Elba island, and a hypothesis of new bus services operating in the high season co-created with the engagement of managers from the regional Public Transport Authority (Osservatorio della Mobilità—Provincia di Livorno) and from the Transport Operator (CTT-Nord). The third section discusses some lessons that can be drawn from the successes and failures of the co-creation approach in the Elba case. The application has demonstrated the feasibility and suitability of the co-creation process to effectively engage stakeholders and groups of visionary citizens (the “change agents”) in the formulation of sustainable mobility plans and agendas. On the other hand, follow-up was lacking—no formal procedures to implement decisions based on the shared agenda were initiated—and the concluding section of the chapter discusses some reasons for this failure, and possible remedies for better anchoring the co-creation approach in future policymaking

User Satisfaction of the Free Shuttle Bus Service in Petaling Jaya

Public transportation brings more convenience to customer in urban and rural areas. In Malaysia, awareness of using the PJ City bus by passengers in Petaling Jaya is still limited. Many passengers are still unsatisfied with the services provided because the shuttle bus is zero-priced services, so the quality of services are always questioned by access users. Therefore, this current study is to investigate the influences of value, quality and reputation of free shuttle (PJ City) bus services towards customer satisfaction. Understanding what customers expect is very important as it will help to improve the services. Data were collected from users of PJ City bus using a survey questionnaire. The finding further revealed that, value positively influenced the satisfaction of customers. So, it is important for the service provider to enhance its value to the customer.

Designing Zonal-Based Flexible Bus Services Under Stochastic Demand

In this paper, we develop a zonal-based flexible bus services (ZBFBS) by considering both passenger demands’ spatial (origin-destination or OD) and volume stochastic variations. Service requests are grouped by zonal OD pairs and number of passengers per request, and aggregated into demand categories which follow certain probability distributions. A two-stage stochastic program is formulated to minimize the expected operating cost of ZBFBS, in which the zonal visit sequences of vehicles are determined in stage 1, whereas in stage 2, service requests are assigned to either regular routes determined in stage 1 or ad hoc services that incur additional costs. Demand volume reliability and detour time reliability are introduced to ensure quality of the services and separate the problem into two phases for efficient solutions. In phase 1, given the reliability requirements, we minimize the cost of operating the regular services. In phase 2, we optimize the passenger assignment to vehicles to minimize the expected ad hoc service cost. The reliabilities are then optimized by a gradient-based approach to minimize the sum of the regular service operating cost and expected ad hoc service cost. We conduct numerical studies on vehicle capacity, detour time limit and demand volume to demonstrate the potential of ZBFBS, and apply the model to Chengdu, China, based on real data to illustrate its applicability.