Route Optimization of Customized Buses Based on Optimistic and Pessimistic Values

To further study the impact of passenger personality on customized bus route selection, this paper takes into account passengers' degree of optimism and studies their psychological expectation of bus arrival time and their tolerance of its untimely arrival. On this foundation, the study obtains the operation schemes of customized buses under different optimism coefficients. The results show that the operation schemes and passengers' choice will always strike a balance under different optimism coefficients, and with increasing optimism coefficients, the number of buses, operation time, operation cost and travel distance will all decrease, but the untimely rate of the buses will consequently increase. To solve the proposed model, the corresponding particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm is designed. In view of the former mode, in which buses can never provide service to the drop-off stations until the boarding stations are completely serviced, the proposed coding rule can provide service to the boarding stations and the drop-off stations alternately. Furthermore, based on the local road network and the actual travel demand of passengers in Lanzhou, China, the paper finds that 0.4 is the optimum value of the optimism coefficient; the operation cost associated with this value is reduced effectively, and the capacities of buses are fully utilized, with acceptable delays.