Estimation of Passenger Flow for Planning and Management of Railway Stations

Large scale renovation of rail stations to cater for growing passenger demand has been taking place in various sites in Japan. These projects pose a challenge to researchers to identify suitable technical methods to develop infrastructure layouts that efficiently cater for movement of walking passengers.This paper presents an application in relation to the JR Takatsuki station where there was a narrow island platform catering for large volume of boarding, alighting and transferring passengers. In 2015, the operator has begun expanding the station to alleviate the platform congestion.The objective of the project is to develop a method of forecasting pedestrian flow patterns within a railway station for a proposed new layout of platforms and interconnecting links. The methodology will be demonstrated using Takatsuki station as a case study. The core of the methodology utilizes pedestrian origin-destination pattern to estimate measures of walking effort of pedestrians. In addition to the analytical modelling technique an application of a simulation model is also described. The simulation method is helpful as it is able to provide a visual appreciation of the future operation of the railway concourses.Results indicate that the congestion on the current platform will be alleviated. However, connecting passages to the new platform can become congested because of flow conflicts among transferring passengers and those boarding and alighting.