A Tool to Assess Regional Public Transport Plans for Integrated Systems

The study developed a tool which can be used by planners to assess the quality of their regional public transport plan and to produce a well-integrated system. The five attributes of integration were adopted, network integration, integrated timed-transfer, integrated physical connection for transfers, information integration and fare and ticketing integration, to develop a framework which illustrates the relationship between them. The tool is composed of the framework developed and a multi-criteria decision making approach; three steps are required to complete the assessment. In Step 1, each integration attribute is scored at upper level and for each sub-attribute based on the information provided in the plan. Step 2 involves the analytical hierarchy approach (AHP), a multi-criteria decision-making tool, to determine the weight of each attribute based on its importance. The final step is to calculate the total weighted score of the plan. The novelty of the approach is the integration of a well-defined and easy to use framework with a systematic, hierarchical weighting model. Two case studies are undertaken to demonstrate the use of the tool. The studies included two regional plans of New Zealand's two most metropolitan cities, Auckland and Wellington. The results have demonstrated that the tool can be used to assess the quality of public transport plans for integration. The tool's ability to indicate deficiencies can assist decision makers to improve their planning towards a better public transport system.