Collaborative passenger flow control of urban rail transit network considering balanced distribution of passengers

The increase of urban traffic demands has directly affected some large cities that are now dealing with more serious urban rail transit congestion. In order to ensure the travel efficiency of passengers and improve the service level of urban rail transit, we proposed a multi-line collaborative passenger flow control model for urban rail transit networks. The model constructed here is based on passenger flow characteristics and congestion propagation rules. Considering the passenger demand constraints, as well as section transport and station capacity constraints, a linear programming model is established with the aim of minimizing total delayed time of passengers and minimizing control intensities at each station. The network constructed by Line 2, Line 6 and Line 8 of the Beijing metro is the study case used in this research to analyze control stations, control durations and control intensities. The results show that the number of delayed passengers is significantly reduced and the average flow control ratio is relatively balanced at each station, which indicates that the model can effectively relieve congestion and provide quantitative references for urban rail transit operators to come up with new and more effective passenger flow control measures.