A multi-criteria approach for prioritizing advanced public transport modes (APTM) considering urban types in Korea

This paper presents a multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) framework to prioritize advanced public transport modes (APTM) in Korea considering the urban types of new towns. In Korea, to overcome the shortcomings of conventional transportation modes such as buses and subways, the introduction of advanced public transit modes that deliver eco-friendly and cost efficient transport has become a critical issue in public transportation policy. Therefore, when a new town is designed, the adoption of APTM should be seriously considered as part of the municipal public transportation system. As part of efforts to provide basic and evidence-based information for the successful introduction of APTM in Korea, we explored which values an APTM initiative should pursue most extensively and investigated the option of APTM to best meet those values, considering the urban type in which the APTM will be operated. In this study, the decision criteria for evaluating the competitiveness of each APTM were suggested, and a hierarchical structure for the decision-making process was developed. Subsequently, dividing the types of new towns into the Metropolis type and the Small & medium-scale city type, relative weights of decision criteria are derived using MCDA, and the competitiveness of each APTM alternative is quantified in order to prioritize each mode for the type of city where the APTM will be introduced.