Influence of Passenger Flow at the Station Entrances on Passenger Satisfaction Amid COVID-19

Simulation of travel document purchase measures aimed at preventing the spread of COVID-19 - Case study from Slovakia

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on railway services, such as restrictions on transport services, introduction of strict anti-pandemic measures at railway stations, and a ban on free travel. This study simulated passenger flow at the Bratislava railway station before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. This study provides an overview of the number of tickets sold, average waiting time of passengers, and time spent by passengers at ticket windows during peak and off-peak hours. The mass-service theory was used as the operational research method. In addition, the user interface of the AnyLogic simulation programme and practical results of the passenger flow simulations at the Bratislava railway station are discussed. The simulation results showed that passenger movement at the railway station was neither synchronised nor systematic. This concurred with the measures implemented during the pandemic that were considered unacceptable. New methods for selling travel documents at Slovak railway stations were proposed, which contribute to better spatial organisation of the stations, faster customer service at ticket windows, and negating infection risks.

A systematic review of COVID-19 transport policies and mitigation strategies around the globe

This paper reports a Scopus-based systematic literature review of a wide variety of transportation policies and mitigation strategies that have been conducted around the world to minimize COVID-19 contagion risk in transportation systems. The review offers a representative coverage of countries across all continents of the planet, as well as among representative climate regions - as weather is an important factor to consider. The readership interested in policies and mitigation strategies is expected to involve a wide range of actors, each involving a particular application context; hence, the literature is also characterized by key attributes such as: transportation mode; actor (users, operators, government, industry); jurisdiction (national, provincial, city, neighborhood); and area of application (planning, regulation, operations, research, incentives). An in-depth analysis of the surveyed literature is then reported, focusing first on condensing the literature into 151 distinct policies and strategies, which are subsequently categorized into 25 broad categories that are discussed at length. The compendium and discussion of strategies and policies reported not only provide comprehensive guidelines to inform various courses of action for decision-makers, planners, and social communicators, but also emphasize on future work and the potential of some of these strategies to be the precursors of meaningful, more sustainable behavioral changes in future mobility patterns.

Open Business Model of COVID-19 Transformation of an Urban Public Transport System: The Experience of a Large Russian City

Dialectics, or developmental transformation, would eventually cause any system to change. The level and depth of these changes vary and depend on the power of external influence and system reservation mechanisms. The art of managing system processes consists of two main aspects. The first aspect involves the sagacity of managers and predicting general environmental change trends (and their impacts on the managed system). The second involves adjusting to these trends, maximizing possible benefits, and minimizing the negative manifestations of this process. Innovation plays an important role, contributing to system transformations with maximal effect and minimal loss. Public transport systems are important elements in cities, as they provide spatial mobility for at least half of the citizens of a city who cannot use individual transportation. Modern urbanization and peculiarities of the social–economic statuses of many citizens contribute to the fact that organized public transportation is unprofitable. The low solvency of citizens who use public transportation services means that passenger transport systems do not work with enough profitability. As a result, governing institutions often choose to subsidize unprofitable transporter activities, thereby prolonging the functioning of unprofitable routes. This is possible only in conditions of sustainability (in regards to a non-optimal system), when the environment is calm, and its negative impact is low. “Black swans” (according to N. Taleb) are bifurcation factors that break the sustainability of non-optimal system. Urban public transport (UPT) of a large Russian city, Tyumen, experienced it in 2020, in connection with the COVID-19 lockdown. The sharp decrease in population mobility in Tyumen, in 2020–2021, caused the need for a complete transformation of the transport service system. However, managers did not want to fundamentally change a system that consensually suited most counterparties. The search for new balances in a system that demands transformation is one way for sustainable provision. This article looks at the transformation and sustainability of a UPT system in the large Russian city of Tyumen, under conditions affected by the negative impact of COVID-19. Results of a comparative (i.e., pre-crisis (2019) and crisis (2020)) Pareto analysis of the contributions of different UPT routes are presented. Transformation of the structure of the UPT route system can overcome the “crisis” COVID-19 period and minimize its financial-economic costs.

Electric Shared Mobility Services during the Pandemic: Modeling Aspects of Transportation

The global spread of the COVID-19 virus has led to difficulties in many branches of the economy, including significant effects on the urban transport industry. Thus, countries around the world have introduced different mobility policies during the pandemic. Due to government restrictions and the changed behaviors of transport users, companies providing modern urban mobility solutions were forced to introduce new business practices to their services. These practices are also apparent in the context of the electric shared mobility industry. Although many aspects and problems of electric shared mobility have been addressed in scientific research, pandemic scenarios have not been taken into account. Noticing this research gap, we aimed to update a previously developed model of factors that influence the operation of electric shared mobility by incorporating aspects related to the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on this industry. This article aims to identify the main factors influencing the electric shared mobility industry during the COVID-19 and post-lockdown periods, together with their operation areas and the involved stakeholders. The research was carried out on the basis of expert interviews, social network analysis (SNA), and the use of the R environment. The article also presents sustainable transport management recommendations for cities and transport service operators, which can be implemented after a lockdown caused by an epidemic. The results in this paper can be used to support transport modeling and the creation of new policies, business models, and sustainable development recommendations. The contents will also be helpful to researchers worldwide in preparing literature reviews for articles related to sustainable management in the COVID-19 pandemic reality.

Management of Competitiveness of Metropolis Public Transport in the COVID-19 Pandemic Based on Core Consumers’ Values

The aim of the paper focuses on generating insights into the competitiveness of public transport in Moscow City in relation to the use of personal cars, considering individual basic consumer values and environmental factors, including the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The research question in this study is: how can we assess the main indicators of public transport’s competitiveness, which can motivate personal car owners with specific basic values to change the transportation mode for personal mobility? This conceptual research model combines the content analysis of publications and large-scale online survey of Moscow City’s car owners—potential consumers of public transport services—on a representative quota sample of 1263 respondents. The methodology includes the axiological approach for the identification of the main factors of consumer behavior of personal car owners in the city with combinations of the modified Schwartz’s methodology of the basic individual values evaluations. Secondary data manifested the changes in the behavior of car owners due to the fact that they value metropolitan environmental degradation and changed their transportation preferences to public transport even during the COVID-19 pandemic. Based on the factor and cluster analysis of the value profile of the individuals, seven clusters of car owners were identified, and two large clusters were selected as target segments for public transport services. The conclusion was made that it is necessary to differentiate social and marketing programs to promote the competitiveness of public transport in the minds of consumers.