Paratransit

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Paratransit

• March 21, 2007

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Paratransit fill gaps in transportation
spectrum

• Those forms of urban passenger transportation
  which are available to the public, are distinct
  from conventional transit (scheduled bus and
  rail) and can operate over the highway and street
  systems.US DOT
• Shuttle, minibus, jitney...
• Paratransit, demand-responsive, dial-a-ride,
  vanpool...
• Characteristics
• not full public transit
• smaller in scale
• use smaller vehicles
• have convenience features of private automobile
• In 1998, demand responsive modes carried 55
  million out of 8746 million total unlinked trips

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Types of Paratransit
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Modern paratransit

• 1960s and before self-generated transportation
  services
• 1960s suburbanization dial-a-ride to serve low
  density areas
• Late 1960s Research efforts to explore options
  and structure operational procedures
• Early 1970s UMTA demonstration programs
• 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act

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UMTA demonstration programs

• Ann Arbor, MI Batavia, NY Haddonfield, NJ
  Westport, CT some hundred others
• Major conclusions
• In low-density areas, a market exists, but
  potential patrons remain sensitive to
  servicerather take the car if at all possible
• Separate bus equal sometimes better than
  mainstreaming
• Goal of grouping trips not easy to achieve
• High costs comparable to taxi
• vehicle acquisition
• request handling and record keeping
• labor
• San Jose great success killed the operation

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Reasons to support paratransit

• Communal transportation EOS
• Mobility for all
• Service quality
• comfort, convenience, privacy, security
• Agility faster
• Flexibility vehicle utilization in different
  ways
• Community spirit
• Job creation
• Ease of Implementation

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Reasons to exercise caution

• Cost considerations
• Use of motor vehicles
• safety, environment, congestion
• Labor issues
• Urban Mass Transit Act of 1964 any proposed
  service that involves federal funds in anyway
  must obtain acceptance from local unions,
  ensuring that existing jobs will not be adversely
  affected
• Driver behavior
• Profit motivation
• Institutional issues

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Modeling dial-a-ride services

• Different rules concerning how much advance
  notice is required for appointments
• well assume immediate response customer waiting
  starts just after making appointment
• Organization is key
• tour strategies
• after each stop, vehicle is routed to nearest
  point, or
• after obtaining a certain number of occupants,
  alternate between pickup and deliveries, or
• collect first, then deliver
• vehicle size
• fleet size, M
• service area , A

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Modeling dial-a-ride services

• Needed inputs
• passenger demand rate for service, ?
• passenger boarding and alighting times, b1 b2
• vehicle speed, V
• dn expected min. distance from some random point
  to its nearest neighbor, with n total points in
  area A
• straight distance
• grid distance

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Modeling dial-a-ride services

• Additional notation
• n number on a vehicle (alighting requests)
• N number waiting in the system (boarding
  requests)
• ?b rate of passenger deliveries per vehicle
• in equilibrium, nN, M ?b?

Average wait for serviceN/? Average riding
timen/?b
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Vanpools

• 3M Minneapolis 1st vanpools system (73)
• motivation expand HQ w/o requiring land for
  parking
• 1980s many big co. invested in ridesharing
  programs
• Prevailing wisdom
• when big co. are willing to invest in
  full/part-time employees to coordinate things,
  ridesharing programs can be successful
• Des Moines, IA
• regional transportation agency (staff of 3)
  acquired 60 vehicles with federal assistance
• assign each vehicle to a recruited driver who
  accommodates 13 coworkers.
• passenger fares cover operating expenses.

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Medicaid Transportation

• Medical Transportation Medicare and Medicaid
• Models for managing Medicaid Non-emergency
  Transportation
• In-house
• Brokerage
• Managed-care
• Brokerage
• has network of transportation enterprises
• screens each request based on eligibility and
  medical state,
• determines the most effective mode for each trip
• assigns and informs the rider
• reimburses specific service provider according to
  predetermined fee schedule
• Transit Pass