Kazuo Nishii

Trip linkages of urban railway commuters under time-space constraints: Some empirical observations

This paper aims at analyzing temporal and spatial constraints underlying rail commuters trip linkages, and examines the role of the terminal station where a commuter transfers lines or leaves. Using an empirical data set of the rail commuters who made a non-work stop in addition to a work stop, distributions of path types by rail line are presented and their spatial extension of stops for non-work activity are quantitatively measured. The analysis further examines relationships between the choice of a non-work stop location and the rail commuters trip pattern. The results provide strong evidence that non-work stops in the after-work paths tend to cluster around the commuting terminal as well as the work place zone.

Recent Developments in Activity Diary-Based Surveys and Analysis

This paper review four case studies based on activity diaries (AD) to provide examples of activity based research in Japan. The focus is on the design and analysis of ADs. The case studies illustrate the richness of the data for analysis and modeling. The analysis of time use is particularly valuable because it offers answers to questions that are difficult to address with traditional travel surveys.

Study of Blog Mining for Examination of Tourist Travel Behavior in Japan

The data on how travelers evaluate a specific sightseeing destination are useful for formulating tourism strategies. Making a survey is the most common way to get such data now, but the method has become difficult because travelers have become so diverse that the data are not as meaningful and substantial as they had been. To overcome this problem, Internet blogs are used: comments on sightseeing are so popular that it is easy to collect the needed data. Blog data on tourism were collected in Yatsugatake, Japan, and compared with the data obtained from ordinary questionnaire surveys to examine the features of blog data. Information from 192 blogs was collected. Analyzing the terminology used in the blogs allowed the determination of some attributes of their authors. These attributes were compared with those of questionnaire survey respondents. Although the desired information can be obtained from survey respondents, information from blogs depends on what the authors write about any destination. Nonetheless, because a bloggers destination is clear in his or her blog, the information about destinations can be used by cooccurrence analysis. With categorization of the entry tags of each blog, information about each bloggers interests can be obtained, and their preferences clearly indicate that their destination choices are closely related to their interests. In sum, although the information in blogs is subjective, if used properly the information can be effective in developing strategies for tourism by complementing data from ordinary surveys.

An Analysis of Information Necessity Related to the Temporal and Spatial Characteristics of Sightseeing Excursion Behaviors: Toward Development of the Regional ITS

Recently, many of vigorous ITS researches have been expanded into transportation planning areas. These researches, however, have not established their systematic methodologies for transportation problem in sightseeing areas as a regional ITS. To develop ITS in sightseeing places, this paper proposes an analysis of infonnation needs considering timing, content, and media for decision-making on sightseeing excursion behavior. In the prior step to develop ITS in tourist areas, there are problems to extract basic issues in tourist excursion behavior and needs for tourist information. A case study is dealing with analysis of tourist informationeeds based on timespace characteristics in Mt Fuji area.

A Structural Equations Model for Evaluating the Effects of Highway Construction

This study focuses on the qualitative factors determining the effects of highway construction. They correspond to convenience on inhabitants daily life, communication opportunity, and amenities of highway-driving and mobility. Two types of linear structural Models are developed for evaluating the effects of highway construction: One is an individual-based model that deals with the relations between the latent variables and observed qualitative factors. The other is an aggregate typed model. The latter can estimate the whole effects related to the qualitative factors and compare them with each other.

Some Characteristics of Network-Connectivity in Highways: Trip Chaining Analysis

The purpose of this paper is to identifiy the relation between highway construction and the formation of trip chainings by zone, considering both ratio of the munber of car-users after highway construction and the distance from the center area to each zone. After some characteristics concerning trip chaining patterns are empirically explored, a Markov-chain model is developed to estimate the values of the network-connectivity index before/after highway construction.

A Pricing Problem in Competitive Routes of Urban Expressway under The Over-lapped Uniform Fare Circles

The purpose of this paper is to propose a toll system of an urban expressway under the condition that competitive routes are existing in the over-lapped uniform fare circles. After reviewing the over-lapped pricing model developed previously, an additional constraint concerning the fare-balance between competitive routes in the expressway will be incorporated into the model. This improved model thus intends to obtain an optimal solution of the on-lamp and check-point fares satisfying the constraint that fare-difference in the two routes is less than benifit of the saving-time derived from the reduced traffic demand in relatively expensive route. Firstly, a fixed demand type of the model is formulated and its basic properties will be presented. This model focuses on effectiveness of two types of the fare-balance constraint. Secondly, a demand-responsed type of model is developed and empirically examined through a practical application.

Traffic Flow Analysis of Recreational Arterials for Their Improvements

The purpose of this paper is to analyze basic characteristics of travel demand and traffic flow in recreational arterials in Fuji Five Lakes area to make use of them for the improvement of arterial road network. This analysis focuses on temporal and spatial distributions of hourly traffic volume; the K-factor and the D-value will be empirically examined comparing them with the ones of workday traffic in an urban area. The paper also presents a simulation model of travel time on the route located near Yamanaka-Lake. This model can allow us to quantitatively describe the effects of behaviors of parking on the traffic condition. These results have indicated that some of the characteristics obtained can offer us a better understanding for an arterial improvement planning.