Trip Generation

CE 451/551 Grad students …

need to discuss
“projects” at end
of class

Source: NHI course on

Travel Demand Forecasting
(152054A)
 Terminology
• Trip generation
• Person trip
• Vehicle trip
• Trip end
• Trip production
• Trip attraction
• Trip purposes
– Home-based work (HBW) trip
– Non-home based (NHB) trip … others
• Special generator
• Socioeconomic data
• Demographic data
Image: http://www.angryspec.com/scrounge.htm
 Trip purposes
Practice has shown that better travel forecasting models
are obtained if trips by different purposes are identified and
modeled separately. The most common trip purposes are:
– HBW
– HBO Others?
– NHB

In TDF, trip productions and attractions are used to

represent the ends of a trip. A production is the home end
of an HB trip and the beginning of a NHB trip.

HB trips (urban) constitute ~70% of all trips

Trips, by purpose (the objective)

PA Table
 Typical Trip Generation Process
Demographic and Socioeconomic inputs

Cross Classification Model

Trip Productions by
zone, by purpose

Employment, attraction landuse data

Balance (system-wide)
Regression model

PA Tables,
Trip Attractions by zone, by purpose
by purpose
Balancing attractions to productions

Rule of thumb:
original
estimates of
total production
and attractions
should be
within 10% of
each other.
 What is trip generation a
function of?
• Land use
• Intensity
• Location/accessibility
• Time
• Type (person, transit, auto,
walking …)

Photo by en:User:Aude, taken on March 7, 2006 Graphic source: http://www4.uwm.edu/cuts/utp/routeloc.pdf

 Trip Generation
• Determine number of “trip ends”
• Methods
– Regression
– Cross Classification (tables)
– Rates based on activity units (ITE)

Image: www.caliper.com
aggregation
hides
variability Regression “Estimating”
a model
Y = f(X)
• Aggregate (zonal) or disaggregate (household)
• Linear or nonlinear
• Dependent (Y) variable is trips
• Independent (Xi) variables are …
– Household attributes
• E.g., population, auto ownership, income level
– Employment attributes
• E.g., number of employees or size of establishments
– Could include network attributes?
• Be careful of … co-linearity, power
• Can use your own data (best?) or borrow parameters
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 See wiki on
Contingency tables

Cross classification models

• Breaks the trip generation process • Advantages
into steps – No prior info on
• Relies on aggregate data collected shape of curves
must be assumed
from surveys (like Census), like
– Simple, easy to
average income by understand
– income categories – Can be used to
– auto ownership account for time,
– Trip rate/auto space
– Trip purpose % • Disadvantages
• Resembles regression, but non- – Does not permit
parametric (like regression with extrapolation
dummy variables) – No goodness of fit
measures
• Groups households in different strata – Requires large
• 1-4+ submodels (table based) sample size
• Improved by adding info
From: Amarillo 1990 model docs, ITE
 One step Cross classification
model (productions)
HBW

2007 eq.*

0-$8000

$8K-$16K

$16K-$32K

$32K-$56K

$56K plus

* Note: US avg. median HH income = $30K in 1990 … is now $50,000 (2007)

From: Amarillo 1990 model

 One step Cross classification
model (productions)
NHB

2007 eq.

0-$8000

$8K-$16K

$16K-$32K

$32K-$56K

$56K plus

From: Amarillo 1990 model

Multi-step Cross Classification
Example
Source: ITE (Univ. of Idaho)
First … Develop the family of cross class curves and find number of
households in each income group
00
Given
(from
survey)

Note: orange
lines show
how to
develop the
curves
M H

L
Now find … percent of
households in each auto
ownership/income group
“class” …
 A

Given
(from
survey)

15K 25K 55K

L M H
Now find … trips per
households in each
auto ownership/income
group “class” …
 Given B
(from
survey)

L M H
Now find … trips by
purpose in each income
group “class” …
 Given C
(from
survey)

L M H
 Recall the problem …

For the zone … multiply the number of households in each income group (00)
by the percent of households owning certain number of cars by income group
(A) to get the total number of households by auto ownership in each income
group (00 x A) …see next slide series

Multiply the result (00xA) by the number of trips generated by each income
group/auto ownership category (B) to get trips by income group/auto ownership
category (00xAxB). Sum to get trips by income level (∑(00xAxB)).

Multiply this sum by the percent of trips by purpose (C) to get trips by purpose
by income group (Cx∑(00xAxB)).

Sum over all income groups to get (total trips by purpose from the zone). ANS
 00

Low
x
Med

High

= 00xA

=
x
00xAxB
C

= Cx∑(00xAxB)
 Cross classification model
(attractions)

Note: Less data than for productions, can use cross-class or regression,
most common classification is by type of employment
1998 Austin, TX household travel survey
Experience Based Analysis

See also Wisconsin

Trip Rate Files
(Madison has
annotation)

Click in slideshow mode

 Typical trip gen application
• Traffic engineers use rates (e.g. ITE),
why? (data, peak)
• Planners use cross class and regression,
why? (purpose, forecasting)
• Can we use rates in the TDF? How?

• http://www.ite.org/tripgen/Trip_Generation
_Data_Form.pdf
 Special generators

• Shopping malls (large)

• Hospitals (different)
• Military institutions
• Airports (large) Click in slideshow mode

• Colleges and universities (large, different)

• Stadiums (off peak)
• Elderly housing (small)