Evaluation of public transport: Method for application in open planning

This paper discusses a method to evaluate sceduled, fixed-route public transport. One major evaluation criterion in the method is total travel time, subdivided into walking time, waiting time, time on vehicle, transfer time, and concealed waiting time. The other major criterion is cost incurred by a given supply of transport. In contrast with conventional methods, this method operates with real measures, i.e. real location (instead of traffic zones), real time (instead of average travel time), and real costs (instead of proxy-costs). The purpose is to produce relevant and easily understandable results suitable to open planning, for instance with citizen participation. Five examples of application of the method are given: (1) evaluation of changes in suburban bus services; (2) evaluation of geographical localities as regards public transport; (3) evaluation of circular bus routes; (4) evaluation of flexible work hours versus fixed work hours and, finally; (5) production of user information on transport service.