Are Buses Reliable?

James Smaldon, Mahesh Dhakal,

Ene Etteh, Livia Chen & Faisal Alshanfaa
 What is Reliability?

• “An attribute of any system that

consistently produces the same results,
preferably meeting or exceeding its
specifications, or in other words the extent
to which an experiment, test, or measuring
procedure yields the same results on
repeated trials”. (Dictionary.com, 2011)
Why is Reliability Important in
Public Transport?

• “uncertainty and delays aggravating anxiety and

discomfort for the passengers and increases costs
due to lost mileage and lower fleet utilisation for
the operators” (Liu and Sinha, 2005).

• Government emphasis on a reliable bus service in

order to ensure its competitiveness to car use
such that it results in modal shift, in an effort to
meet carbon emissions targets.
What affects Reliability?

• Traffic Characteristics
• Route Characteristics
• Passenger Characteristics
• Bus operational Characteristics
How is Reliability Measured?

• Journey Time Reliability (Polus, 1978);

• Adherence to the Timetable (Bates et al.,
2001);
• Maintaining regularity between buses
(headway) (Jonas & Furth, 2002); and
• Passenger Waiting Time at the Bus Stops
(Chapman, 1976).
 Data Collection

• On-Bus Data Collection

• Bus Stop Data

Collection

• Bus Stop Questionnaire

 Summary of Data
Collection
• 4 days surveyed in Total - Term-time and
Half-term
• University Interchange, Portswood - U1A,
U1C, U2B, U2C, U6C, U6H, U9
• Peak and Off peak times
• 190 questionnaires completed successfully
 Hypotheses

1. Actual bus journey time duration will differ from scheduled bus
journey time duration.

2. The method of payment will affect reliability

3. The headway of the buses will affect their reliability.

4. People will perceive buses to be less reliable than they actually

are.
Factors affecting journey time
 Hypothesis Test 1 - Actual bus journey time duration will differ from
scheduled bus journey time duration.

Summary of Hypothesis test for the journey from

1. Hypothesis Testing for Mean Airport Parkway Station to Dock gate 4
Journey Time: (Verified by SPSS Scheduled Null Alternative
Test: One Sample t-test ) Journey time
(min)
Hypothesis
H0
Hypothesis
H1
Sample Size
N
Reject H0
if
Conclusion

50 H0: µ = 50 min H1: µ≠ 50 min 4 t > 3.182 or t t = 2.453

2. Tested for: Actual Journey Time

< -3.182 Do not reject
H 0.

≠ Scheduled Journey Time

3. Ho: µ = Scheduled Journey Time,

H1: µ ≠ Scheduled Journey Time Sample SPSS output
One-Sample Statistics
N Mean Std. Deviation Std. Error Mean

4. Results show that the journey Actual_Journey_Time 4 52.0000 1.63299 .81650

times are generally reliable, One-Sample Test

Test Value = 50
however further research and a 95% Confidence Interval

larger sample size will be t df Sig. (2-tailed)

Mean
Difference
of the Difference
Lower Upper
required to prove the test Actual_Journey_Time 2.449 3 .092 2.00000 -.5985 4.5985
 Hypothesis Test 2 - The method of payment will affect reliability.

Correlations are significant at

0.01 level.

Dwell time increases

with the increase of No.
paying cash and card

Slope of people
paying by cash
is much steeper
ANOVA Test by card

Y=14.579+6.367X1+3.157X2+!.

54.2% of the No. of people ticketing by different

methods made contribution to the Dwell time.
R squared=0.542
 Hypothesis Test 3 - The headway of the buses will affect their reliability.

Scatter plot showing the relationship between Punctuality

Headway Differences

Summary of results for one-sample t-tests: for every bus not running
to the scheduled headway (i.e. Actual Headway ≠ Scheduled
headway), the bus will depart on time (i.e. punctuality = 0)
Bus Punctuality Null Alternative Sample
Service (min) Hypothesis Hypothesis Size Reject H0 Conclusion
H0 H1 N if
t > 1.998 or t = 6.527
U1C 0 H0: µ = 0 H1: µ≠ 0 min 67
t < -1.998 Reject H0.
min
t > 2.007 or t = 3.733
U1A 0 H0: µ = 0 H1: µ≠ 0 min 53
t < -2.007 Reject H0.
min
H 0: µ = 0 t > 1.860 or t = 3.024
U2B 0 H1: µ≠ 0 min 9
min t < -1.860 Reject H0.
t = 0.480
H 0: µ = 0 t > 2.262 or
U2C 0 H1: µ≠ 0 min 10 Do not reject
min t < -2.262
H 0.
H 0: µ = 0 t > 2.110 or t = 2.750
U6C 0 H1: µ≠ 0 min 18
min t < -2.110 Reject H0.
H 0: µ = 0 t > 2.086 or t = 3.042
U6H 0 H1: µ≠ 0 min 21
min t < -2.086 Reject H0.
 Hypothesis Test 4 - People will perceive buses to be less reliable than
they actually are.
Summary of one sample t-tests: Actual headway =Scheduled headway
Bus Scheduled Null Alternative Sample
Service Headway Hypothesis Hypothesis Size Reject H0 Conclusion
(min) H0 H1 N if
H0: µ = 10 H1: µ≠ 10 t > 1.990 or t = 1.177
U1C 10 84
min min t < -1.990 Do not reject H0.
H0: µ = 10 H1: µ≠ 10 t > 1.990 or t = 1.284
U1A 82
10 min min t < -1.990 Do not reject H0.
H0: µ = 30 H1: µ≠ 30 t > 2.201 or t = 1.092
U2B 30 12
min min t < -2.201 Do not reject H0.

H0: µ = 30 H1: µ≠ 30 t > 2.201 or t = -0.057

U2C 30 12
min min t < -2.201 Do not reject H0.

H0: µ = 30 H1: µ≠ 30 t > 2.064 or t = 0.257

U6C 30 25
min min t < -2.064 Do not reject H0.

H0: µ = 30 H1: µ≠ 30 t > 2.069 or t = 0.175

U6H 30 24
min min t < -2.069 Do not reject H0.
 Limitations

• Limited sample size

• Lack of Inter-peak
• Friday bias
• Subjective view of reliability
• Excess data collection
 Further Research
Potential
• Increase the number and variety of surveyed bus
services
• Increase the number of days and peaks surveyed
• Expand the study area to include rural and adjacent
settlements
• Assess incomes and demographics of the local
population
• Early review of data collection, and
• GIS - both mapping and data logging
 Final Conclusions
• ‘Are Buses Reliable?’ - there are many ways
to define and measure reliability. We have
covered a number of these but reliability is
subjective and what is reliable to one
person, could be unreliable to another.
• From this study, the buses surveyed have
been found to be generally reliable.