CVL 316

Transportation Engineering
Winter 2025

Yoassry Elzohairy, Ph.D., P.Eng.

Adjunct Professor

Wednesday, February 12, 2025

Travel Demand Forecasting

Input: land use and household

characteristics
Four-Step Planning Process
 Trip Generation: How many trips?
 Trip Distribution: Which destination?
 Modal Choice: Which mode?
 Assignment: Which route?
Output: Level of Service based on
predicted demand
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Four-step Transportation
Planning Process

Trip Generation determines

the total number of person
trips that begin or end in a
zone (or number of inbound
and outbound vehicle trips) ,
usually over a 24-hour period.

Trip Distribution finds

the number of person
trips that go between
all pairs of zones.

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 Four-step Transportation
Planning Process (cont’d)
The modal split finds the
number of trips using each
available mode between a
production/attraction pair.
As with trip distribution,
Modal Choice mode split is typically
performed on 24-hour
person-trips.

The major outputs of traffic

assignment step are volumes
i j on all links, turning
movements at selected
intersections and delays from
Network Assignment congestion.

(Trip Assignment) 4
 Traffic Analysis Zone (TAZ)
 TAZ: Traffic Analysis Zone
 A TAZ is an arbitrary subdivision of the study area

 TAZs are used in trip generation and trip distribution

 TAZs may be any shape or size, but Census Blocks, Block

Groups, and Tracts are often used

Block Block Group Tract

i.e., a
city block

A census tract is a small statistical subdivision of county with about 2,500 to 8,000 residents.
The census tracts are arranged such that they represent relatively homogeneous areas in population, economic and living characteristics.
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 Usual Unit of Analysis
 Zonal rates (Number of trips as a function of
a zone’s population characteristics; e.g.;
population, avg income) (aggregate model)
 Household rates (Number of trips as a
function of household characteristics; e,g,;
household size, income) (disaggregate
model)
 Person rates (Number of trips as a function of
person characteristics)

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 Productions and Attractions

Home Work Shop Home

Zone 1 Zone 2 Zone 3 Zone 1

NHB
HB-Work HB-Shop

Home-based (HB) trip: home is the origin or the destination

Non-home-based (NHB) trip: neither end of the trip is home
1) For HB, trips are assumed to be produced at the “home” zone
and attracted to the “non-home” zone, e.g. Work
2) For NHB, trips are assumed to be produced at the “origin”
zone and attracted to the “destination” zone. Trip origin &
destination is based on the direction of a trip (from “origin”
to “destination.”)

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Productions and Attractions
Home Work

Home Work

2 Productions 2 Attractions
HB

Production Attraction

Work Shop

Attraction Production

NHB

3) generally, will have some productions, PI, and attractions, AJ,

in each zone
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Example

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 I. Trip Generation

 Objective: forecast number of person trips

that begin or end in a travel analysis zone
(TAZ) for a typical day in a target year
 Mathematical formulation of Trip Generation
 Regression models
 Trip-rate Analysis
 Cross-Classification Models
 Prior to application, model must be
calibrated using travel data for base year

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 I.1. Regression Models
 Yi = a0 + a1X1i + a2X2i + … + anXni
where:
Yi - trip ends for the ith household or zone
Xni - nth attribute of the ith household or zone

1) Model calibrated using travel survey data for the

base year.
2) Apply model to estimate future “trip ends”
based on projections of the values of the
independent variables, Xni.
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 Regression Models (cont’d)

Independent Variables
 Must be highly correlated with the dependent variable
 Must not be highly correlated between themselves

Typical Independent Variables

1) Income
2) Auto ownership
3) Household size
4) Land use density
5) Number of employees (attractions)
6) Sq. feet of floor area (attractions)

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 I.2. Trip Rate Analysis
 Trip rates are expressed with respect to the
intensity of use at specific traffic generators
PI   Rk X k
k

where:

PI - total trip productions in zone I

Rk - trip prod. per unit of the kth land use type
Xk - number of units of the kth land use type

- ITE Trip Generation Manual (Ex: Single-Family

Detached Housing)
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 For ITE Trip Generation Manual:
Tutorial on Data Elements, Plz see

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSkHGTb1HNE
 Example

Consider a zone that is located in the Golden Triangle area. The land-
use data for the zone are as follows: 200,000 sq ft residential, 25,000
sq ft retail, and 10,000 sq ft public library. Determine the number of
trips generated in this zone.

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I.3. Cross-Classification Models

 Represent extension of the previous method

(trip rate models).
 Generally developed at household level.
 Households are classified into three to four
types based on:
1. Household size
2. Vehicle ownership
3. Household income
4. Land development intensity

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A

18
A

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20
Example

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II. Trip Distribution
 Objective: estimate future trip volumes,
QIJ or Tij between zones I and J
 Assumptions:
 All attraction zones, J, in competition
w/others
 Trips to J are proportional to “attractions” AJ
 Trips I to J are inversely proportional to WIJ,
the impedance (time, distance, cost) from I to
J

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 Concept of Trip Distribution
 Based on Newton’s law of gravitation, the force
of attraction between two bodies is directly
proportional to the product of the masses of
the two bodies and inversely proportional to the
square of the distance between them (we
usually use travel time instead of distance).

m1 * m2
F12 
d2
12

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 Gravity Model

 
 
 A j Fij K ij 
Tij  Pi  n   Pi pij

  A j Fij K ij 
 j 1 
Tij = number of trips that are produced in zone i and attracted to zone j
Pi = total number of trips produced in zone i
Aj = number of trips attracted to zone j or relative attractiveness of zone j
Fij = Friction Factor; a value which is an inverse function of travel time
c
Fij = 1/Wij , where c is a calibration constant
Kij = socioeconomic adjustment factor for interchange ij
pij = probability that a trip generated by zone I will be attracted by zone j.

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Example: Application of the
Gravity Model

The interzonal impedances WIJ are given in the following table:

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Solution

Fij = 1/Wijc

Given c = 2.0

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Solution (Cont’d)

Trip productions
of each zone

Trip attractions of each zone

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Example

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Example: The Generation-Distribution Sequence

where
30
Note: - ln W = ln (1/W)

(See Figure A)

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 1
5
5
Propose
d Centre
10

20 2

10
20

4 5 3
CBD

Figure A. Interzonal Impedance

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Solution
Hence for each of the trip-producing zones

The target-year attractiveness of the two competing

commercial zones is calculated via the calculated trip-
attractiveness equation and the relevant land-use
projections as follows:
A4  5  3  3  2.5  22.5
A5  5  2  3  3.0  19.0
The target-year interchange volumes are computed using
the gravity model with the given c =1 and the given Kij
factors. Here are the results:
Kij