LSTM Encoder-Predictor for Short-Term Train Load Forecasting

The increase in the amount of data collected in the transport domain can greatly benefit mobility studies and help to create high value-added mobility services for passengers as well as regulation tools for operators. The research detailed in this paper is related to the development of an advanced machine learning approach with the aim of forecasting the passenger load of trains in public transport. Predicting the crowding level on public transport can indeed be useful for enriching the information available to passengers to enable them to better plan their daily trips. Moreover, operators will increasingly need to assess and predict network passenger load to improve train regulation processes and service quality levels. The main issues to address in this forecasting task are the variability in the train load series induced by the train schedule and the influence of several contextual factors, such as calendar information. We propose a neural network LSTM encoder-predictor combined with a contextual representation learning to address this problem. Experiments are conducted on a real dataset provided by the French railway company SNCF and collected over a period of one and a half years. The prediction performance provided by the proposed model are compared to those given by historical models and by traditional machine learning models. The obtained results have demonstrated the potential of the proposed LSTM encoder-predictor to address both one-step-ahead and multi-step forecasting and to outperform other models by maintaining robustness in the quality of the forecasts throughout the time horizon.