A Methodology for Predicting Taxi Development Scale in Small and Medium-Sized Cities

摘要

Recently, numerous theories have emerged focusing on the taxi scale in large cities, but few of these theories have been empirically studied in small cities. In this paper, the taxi industry in Juxian, a county in Rizhao, Shandong, China, is studied by analyzing vehicle type, operation status, business model, occupancy rate, and travel characteristics of passengers. To make the study more useful, a two-step approach is used for taxi scale prediction: first, predict the taxi size using the occupancy rate control method; and second, control the taxi scale based on the actual demands. This approach is shown to perform better than the traditional methods. This analysis provides appropriate strategies with great significance for the operation and development of taxi businesses in small and medium-sized cities.