Design of Commute Carpooling Based on Fixed Time and Routes

Although the private carpooling market of China has grown rapidly, it has been embarrassed by problems such as obstructed information, disordered expense, and frequent crimes currently. In this paper, a commute carpooling program based on fixed time and routes is designed and corresponding carpooling information platform is built to realize information retrieval, information matching, and mutual selection and evaluation. We have practiced the program in Huaian, China, and then evaluated it using the improved time-expense impedance model and VISSIM simulation system. The result shows that the carpooling program can reduce 65%~86% of the time-expense impedance and optimize some network parameters up to 20%~40%. Since it will help in reducing the travel time and cost greatly, improving safety and economy during carpooling, and easing the traffic congestion, it is a worthy carpooling mode to be extended in China. 1. Introduction In China, some growing problems have constrained the development of urban transport and society, which include the crowded city population, the substantial increase of private cars, the urban road congestion, and the traffic pollution [1–3]. According to the data from 2000 to 2012, the private car ownership increased from 6.25 million to 88.38 million. The annual average growth rate was about 122.60%. However, the road mileage increased from 1679.90 thousand kilometers to 4234.50 thousand kilometers. The annual average growth rate was about 107.37%. The road construction is hard to meet the traffic demand. See Figure 1. Figure 1: The road mileage and private car ownership in China, 2000–2012. Traffic congestion, environmental pollution, energy shortages, taxi difficulties, and other issues cause people to begin exploring new and green private car trip modes [4]. A survey shows that there is only one person in 80% of private cars by highway gate during the morning peak hours in Beijing. Such trip efficiency apparently brought great pressure to traffic and environment and caused serious waste of transportation resources [5]. Carpooling will reduce about 400 thousand cars traveling every day in Beijing. Also, the automobile exhaust is causing serious effect on urban environment, and carpooling can reduce the emission of nitrogen oxides and the greenhouse gas (GHG). Besides, just like bus, regular carpooling is an effective way to encourage public transportation. Since the high private car ownership with high empty-loading rate wastes huge traffic resources and moreover causes serious traffic congestion and exhaust emission pollution,