Public Transportation Vehicle Maintenance and Regional Maintenance Center: An Analysis of Existing Literature

In order to minimize maintenance cost and improve rural transit vehicles services, a Regional Maintenance Center (RMC) concept was conceived and utilized by the Illinois Department of Transportation (DOT) to maintain and repair rural transit vehicles within a geographical region. The key attributes of an RMC is the resource sharing between urban and rural transit during their respective idle time - the urban transit maintenance facility is utilized to provide vehicle maintenance and repair to rural transit vehicles. Benefits of RMC for rural transit providers include lower vehicle maintenance costs and better maintenance quality. Benefits of RMC for urban transit include lower maintenance operating costs and higher maintenance facility utilization rates. Previous studies show that RMC is a new concept, and research in creating and managing RMCs does not exist. In attempt to assist practitioners in creating and managing RMCs, this study examined existing literature and attempted to identify research, tools, and techniques that are relevant to RMCs. The foci of the literature review are rural and urban transit vehicle management, rural and urban transit vehicle maintenance, vehicle maintenance management, resource sharing, performance measurement on transit vehicle maintenance, and best practice in transit maintenance. A total of 169 publications were found. An analysis of the existing literature showed that research in public transportation management had increased significantly over the past 50 years, with 60% of the existing literature focused on urban transit and 32% focused on rural transit. This study provides an analysis of research relevant to creating and managing a RMC, and provides a compendium of publications in public transit vehicle maintenance and management.