On-demand Ride-sharing Services with Meeting Points

On-demand ride-sharing services propose an alternative transportation mode to public and private transportation. They have similarities with private transportation, since the customers have the convenience of travelling from and to any desired location while defining the departure (or arrival) time. They resemble public transportation in multiple customers sharing a vehicle with similar journeys. This work proposes an approach to improve the throughput of on-demand ride-sharing services by introducing meeting points. The idea bases on combining a vehicle's nearby location visits (whether for pick-up or drop-off) into one, if temporal and spatial constraints are held, in order to reduce the vehicle detour costs. It, by design, diminishes customer convenience, since walking legs are introduced and departure/arrival times might deviate from what is desired. The trade-offs are evaluated by running two simulations, one without and one with meeting points. The results indicate that even a small customer inconvenience can yield significant increase in the number of satisfied trip requests without increasing vehicle costs.