Viability study of integrating bus aggregators to improve the existing public transport service quality: a case of Hyderabad

Abstract

The rapidly growing population has induced the growth of travel demand that has further resulted in the increased dependency on private motorized modes of vehicle. Even though there is an increased travel demand, the existing municipal bus services are going in huge financial losses. One of the major reasons behind the reduced ridership of the existing city bus service is the degraded quality of transport service. The quality of the existing bus service does not complies with the expectations of users. Improving the quality of the service is a way to overcome this problem, but due to poor financial condition, existing city buses are not being able to fulfill the existing demand. The main target is to shift the existing private motorized users majorly car users and car based aggregator users to a more sustainable mode of transport. Even though government is spending a huge amount on public transport service, still it is unable to meet the demands of comfortable, fast and reliable means of transport and lack in shifting people from private vehicles to public transport service. A better alternative is to invite private entities to act as a backbone of city’s public transport service and let them serve the existing users demand with reducing the gap between the expected quality of service and the provided quality of service. Services with advanced technology for conveniently requesting, tracking and paying for the travel are changing the travel behavior of the people. Shared mobility services being a sustainable mode of transport are emerging with a high pace filling the gaps in the existing public transportation system. A bus aggregator is an ondemand travel service that complies with the expected quality of service by users. It allows private investors to come up with such bus service and serve the areas specified by the government providing convenient boarding points along predetermined routes, providing direct trips to passengers. Users can locate their pick-up and drop-off locations using smartphone applications. It provides seat assurance, electronic payment, passenger information system, real time tracking, wireless internet, air-conditioner and passenger security. The existing city bus service of Hyderabad city is served by Telangana State Road Transport Corporation (TSRTC). The aim of the study is to assess the quality and performance of existing public transport system and probe the viability of integrating bus aggregators in the existing public transport system. To understand the problem and issue identification, the various analysis were carried including physical and financial performance of the existing public transport service, traffic analysis zone wise mode share analysis, identification of potential target grop of users using user market segment assessment, analyzing the existing TSRTC bus routes, existing TSRTC bus frequency, The potential users of bus aggregator service came out to be existing car users or car based aggregator users. The existing travel pattern and travel characteristics of residents of the city were analyzed by the origin-destination survey details. The travel pattern for different vehicular modes were analyzed and the traffic analysis zones having maximum trips made by car and car based aggregators were identified. The exiting public transport service quality as perceived by car users and existing car based aggregator users is assessed on the basis of the primary survey carried. The gap between the users’ perception about the existing public transport service quality and the users’ expectations from the public transport service quality is evaluated using SERVQUAL method. Ranking of the existing bus service and car aggregator service on various parameters by users is analyzed. The priority given by the users for the qualitative services provided by the public transport service is obtained. These qualities were incorporated in the proposed service of bus aggregator. The willingness to shift to bus aggregator model was conducted and analyzed the shift of existing car users and car based aggregator users to proposed service. A correlation analysis is being done amongst the travel mode choice of the users and their travel and socio economic characteristics. Utility equations were formed for various vehicle modes and the probability of the users choosing the proposed service is evaluated using multinomial logit model. The proposed ridership and proposed fleet size of the service is calculated. A spatial network plan is proposed delineating the routes for the proposed bus aggregator service linking the traffic analysis zones identified on the basis of maximum number of trips made by car and car based aggregators. The traffic analysis zones where the pilot project of the routes will be proposed were identified. An integration of the proposed spatial network plan with the existing public transport network plan is done. Viability assessment of the proposed bus aggregator model was done to identify the roles and responsibilities of the government and private players and the benefits they both get from the proposed service.