Bus Operating Time Estimation at Bus Bays Considering the Impact of Bus Bunching and Second Door Opening

Bus bunching and second bus door opening are two undesired phenomena that occur frequently at bus bays with multiple and one loading area respectively. They reduce the efficiency of bus operations by inducing extra delays. A reliable estimation of these delays is necessary to evaluate service performance and thus provide insights into how to offer a more efficient and robust public bus transit service. This study focuses on bus operating time estimation at bus bays with special attention on the extra delays caused by bus bunching and second bus door opening. The bus operating time consisting of bus dwell time and entrance-exit clearance time is first defined along with the elaboration of the aforementioned two phenomena. Two models are proposed for bus bays with multiple and one loading area, in which the number of bus stagnated at bus bay before the targeted bus arriving and the occurrence indicator for the second door opening are incorporated as independent variables, respectively. The bus dwell time and entrance-exit clearance time are estimated sequentially by regression approach. The case study of bus bays along Vivo City and West Coast Road in Singapore suggests that the operating time would increase by 8.59s when the number of bus queuing in the bus bay increases by one, and the average delay caused by second door opening is 4.47s. In addition, the comparison and analyses of estimation results demonstrate the reasonability and applicability of the proposed models. This study may serve as a useful guide for bus operators.