Assessing and improving accessibility to public transport in Montevideo, Uruguay.

Abstract

Public transport plays a key role in expanding the distances that people can travel using active modes of transport. Studying walking accessibility to public transportation systems is highly relevant since walking to stops can be particularly challenging for the elderly, citizens with disabilities, and the general population during bad weather conditions or in pedestrian-unfriendly cities. The first objective of this work is to present a study on walking accessibility for the public transport system in Montevideo, Uruguay. The proposed methodology combines information from the bus stops and lines that operate in the city, the road infrastructure, and demographic data to compute walking accessibility indicators to the public transport system. The results of the analysis suggest that 92.38% of the population can access at least one stop when walking up to 400 meters. This value is lower than previous figures reported by the transport authorities that estimated a value of 97% for the same indicator using a less comprehensive methodology. Results also show that accessibility values are not evenly distributed among the population, with young citizens and men showing lower levels of potential mobility compared to their counterparts. Making use of this indicator, the second objective of this work is to define and address the bicycle parking facilities location problem. The goal of this optimisation problem is to improve accessibility by finding suitable locations for bicycle parking facilities to encourage cycling as an alternative access mode. Two types of algorithms are explored to solve this problem: a greedy heuristic and an iterated local search. Results obtained by the algorithms show that the percentage of the population with access increases to 93.41 % by installing just five of these facilities. These improvements help reduce the gap between population groups, with men and children getting a greater benefit from the investments.