A Simulation-based Approach for Sustainable Transportation Systems Evaluation and Optimization: Theory, Systematic Framework and Applications

AbstractDiverse strategies have been proposed and implemented to relieve increasingly serious urban transportation problems. How to evaluate and optimize combined strategies to increase sustainability and improve efficiency of multimodal transportation systems is still a great challenge. This paper proposes a simulation-based systematic framework for sustainable transportation systems evaluation and optimization. Simulation-based optimization (SBO) is incorporated to seek an optimal combination of transportation planning and operations strategies, e.g. congestion pricing for private cars, bus and rail fares, to minimize generalized costs of multimodal traveling in a heuristic way. Applications in a small network of Tianjin Eco-city with multimodal travelers demonstrate the feasibility and applicability of the SBO approach in sustainable transportation systems evaluation and optimization. The objective is to reduce multimodal travel costs subject to a minimum mode share of green transportation. The SBO process also validates that the efficiency of each strategy may be influenced by the strengths of other strategies