Reflecting the Impacts of System-wide Pricing Strategies in an Integrated Continuous-Time Prism-Constrained Activity-Travel Simulator of Demand and Supply

摘要

Pricing policies are increasingly being considered in urban areas around the world to bettermanage travel demand, mitigate adverse impacts of automobile travel, and raise financialresources for much needed infrastructure development. This paper demonstrates the feasibilityof applying an integrated microsimulation model of activity-travel demand and dynamic trafficassignment for analyzing the impact of pricing policies on the entire range of activity-travelchoices. The model system is based on a dynamic integration framework wherein the activity-travel simulator and the dynamic traffic assignment model communicate with one another alongthe continuous time axis so that trips are routed and simulated on the network as and when theyare generated. This framework is applied to the analysis of a systemwide pricing policy for asmall case study site to demonstrate how the model responds to various levels of pricing. Ageneralized travel time measure that accounts for the pricing effect and reflects populationheterogeneity in values of time is used to simulate activity-travel choices, including both activitygeneration and destination choice, in a prism-constrained activity-travel simulation paradigm.Case study results show that trip lengths, travel time expenditures, and vehicle miles of travel areimpacted to a greater degree than activity-trip rates and activity durations as a result of pricingpolicies. Measures of change output by the model are found to be consistent with elasticityestimates reported in the literature, suggesting that the model is able to reflect adjustments inactivity-travel behavior in response to pricing policies.