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Discrete Activity-based Trip Generation Model for Commuters

Min Yang1, Wei Wang1, Xuewu Chen1, and Wenyong Li2
1

Ph.D., lecturer, Jiangsu Provincial Key Laboratory of Transportation Planning and

Management, Southeast University, Nanjing, 210096, China
2
Ph.D., Associate Professor, Guilin University of electronic Technology, Guilin,
541004

Abstract
While aggregate trip generation models are widely utilized in China, they are
incapable of representing the travel decisions made by individuals/households, nor
providing the temporal & spatial characteristics of activities and the trips they
generate. This paper explores a discrete activity-based trip generation model by
multinomial logit method. By taking trip chains which included in activity patterns as
the analysis units, the coherent connections and constraints among multiple activities
and trips can be reflected. In addition, the model contains individual/household
socio-demographics and other policy-sensitive explanatory variables. The utility
function estimated by the model can be applied in a straightforward way to obtain
trip generation by aggregating the individuals choice probability.
Key Words: trip generation; activity-based; discrete choice model
Introduction
Modeling trip generation has been usually considered as the problem of answering a
question such as: how many trips originate at each zone (Ortuzar and Dios, 1999).
Three aggregate and trip-based techniques are frequently utilized in China, including
regression method, cross-classification and land-use based trip rates (Wang, 1998).
However, the travel demand models should represent the travel decisions made by
individuals/households and should incorporate important demographic and
policy-sensitive explanatory variables, which has been widely highlighted
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(Ben-Akiva and Lerman, 1985; Bowman and Ben-Akiva, 2000). This recognition has
led to a shift in the past couple of decades from the aggregate (or zonal level)
modeling paradigm toward the disaggregate (or individual/household level)
modeling paradigm (Bhat, Govindarajan, and Pulugurta, 1998).
Problems with conventional trip generation models resulted from a fundamental
incapability to address the temporal and spatial characteristics of activities and the
trips which they generated. The sequencing and scheduling of trips and activities, and
interactions between household members, are ignored in the standard model.
The object of this paper is to formulate and estimate a discrete activity-based trip
generation model that will facilitate the replacement of traditional aggregate model in
the context of a Chinese city. The model comprehensively considers the attributes of
the individual/household socio-demographics, OD location of work and residential
zones, travel mode as well as the difference between the activity and travel pattern
resulted from the work schedule.
Data Survey and Empirical Analysis
The city selected for this study is Shangyu, a small city located in the middle of the
Yangtse Rive delta region of China. The city has a population of 204,900, and covers
an area of 111km2 with central district of 18.2km2. The administration held a
traditional travel diary survey of about 4101 individuals, above 6 years of age, in
1564 households, and random sampling and face-to-face interview were applied on
Thursday, Apr. 27, 2006. The survey had three distinct sections: household
characteristics, individual socio-demographics and personal travel-activity diary
(Yang, Wang, and Chen et al, 2007).
z Household characteristics: This section includes residential location, household
size, number of household members with jobs, number of children under education
age, identification of household vehicles (including number of cars, motorcycles and
bicycles) and annual household income.
z Individual socio-demographics: This part includes questions designed to classify
the household members according to the following aspects: gender, occupation, age,
educational level and possession of a driving license.
z Travel-activity attributes: That includes trip start and ending times, origin and
destination, mode used, trip purpose (containing the information of activity type) and
activity establishment type, etc. Especially, we put emphasis on trip sequence to
obtain the trip chain as well as test the integrity of the chain.
After inputting above data into Access data-base, and by consistent check and
screening out invalid activity-travel patterns, Matlab programs are developed to pick
up trip chains by linking separate trip purpose sequentially. Transacted data-base is
shown in Table 1. Using the functions included in Matlab and query programs in
Access, empirical statistic characteristics of activity patterns can be investigated.

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Table 1. Data-base of household/individual socio-demographics and activity pattern

characteristics
ID Gender Age Occupation
1
1
5
3

20
0
5
3

41
1
6
5

110
0
6
3

584
0
5
2

Workers
2

Chain Chain* Length

17
hwh
2

1717 hwhwh
4

1387 hwbwh
4

1747 hwhsh
4

16747 hwdhsh
5

Note: ID is the serial number of the individual; workers denotes the number of
household members with jobs; Chain denotes the connection of trip purposes and
Chain* is the activity pattern including activity sequences; Length represents the
total number of trips contained in the whole pattern.
As to commute activity pattern, work is the primary activity, and other activities are
all called the secondary. Accordingly, the tour with work activity is defined the
primary and all other tours are designated as secondary. As the secondary tour
appears less in China, commute activity patterns are classified into six typical
categories, according to the composition of the primary and secondary tour.
The six categories are (a) simple tour from home to work and back again with no
additional stops, (b) tour with at least one additional stop for non-work activity
(hwh+), (c) tour with a work-based subtour for non-work activity (hw+wh), (d) tour
with subtour returning home (hwhwh), (e) complex chain with both a simple primary
tour and at least one secondary tour, (f) complex chain with both a primary tour
having subtour returning home and at least one secondary tour.
Table 2 shows the frequency and length (total number of trips included) distribution
of the six typical activity patterns.
Generally speaking, over 50 percent workers make simple chain (hwh), and pattern
hwhwh takes the second place with 26.10 percent. But other patterns account rather
less frequency. This is in consistent with the fact that less non-work activities are
made during morning and evening commute or at work in Shangyu, a small city in
China.
The length of an activity pattern is equal to the total number of trips included. From
table 2, it is shown that the length is only 2 for the simple tour (hwh), while it is high
to 6.10 for the complex chain with the pattern hwhwh+h. For the length from high to
low, commute activity patterns could be ranked as hwhwh+h, hw+wh, hwh+h,
hwhwh, hwh+, hwh.

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Table 2. The length and frequency distribution of typical activity patterns in shangyu
Activity
Pattern

Description

Simple tour from home to work

and back again with no additional
stops
Tour with at least one additional
hwh+
stop for non-work activity
Tour with a work-based subtour for
hw+wh
Shangyu
non-work activity
hwhwh
Tour with subtour returning home
Complex chain with both a simple
hwh+h
primary tour and at least one
secondary tour
Complex chain with both a
primary tour having subtour
hwhwh+h
returning home and at least one
secondary tour
other
Other tour
hwh

Length
(number
of trips)

Frequency

2.00

52.80%

3.20

2.78%

4.25

2.61%

4.00

26.10%

4.12

7.04%

6.10

6.25%

2.42%

Discrete Activity Pattern Choice Model Formulation

According to random utility theory, the random utility variable called Uin for the ith
activity pattern of the nth individual can be divided into two additive parts (Moshe
Ben-Akiva and Steven R. Lerman, 1985):
U in = Vin + in

(1)

where, Vin is called the systematic component of the utility of i; in is the random part
called disturbances.
It is important to stress that Vin is a function assumed here to be deterministic. When
we use the function that is linear in the parameters, Vin can be expressed as follow:
K

Vin = ' Xin = k xink

(2)

k =1

where K is the number of explanatory variables; k is the kth parameter; Xink is called
the kth specific variable for the ith activity pattern of the nth individual.
If in is Gumbel distributed, the multinomial logit model for the choice of activity
patterns can be straightforwardly derived due to the properties of Gumbel
distribution:

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K

Pin =

exp(Vin )
=
exp(V jn )
j An

exp( k xink )
k =1
K

exp(k x jnk )
j An

(3)

k =1

where Pin is called the choice probability of ith activity pattern of the nth individual.
The parameters can be calibrated by using the Newton-Raphson algorithm to
estimate the maximum likelihood function of the MNL model (Guan Hongzhi,
2004).

Discrete Activity-based Trip Generation Model Estimation

Based on the travel diary survey of Shangyu, variables selected into the model
include individual/household socio-demographics, locational factors, travel and
activity attributes (Yang, 2007). These explanatory variables are included into the
model as dummy variables (they take the value of 0 or 1 only). When the variable
can be divided into k categories, k-1 dummy variables are used for substitute, making
one of them as a referent..
The utility function is linear in the parameters, and we use any particular variable as
alternative specific in as many as J-1 alternatives (J is the total number of
alternatives), because all the matter is the effect of the specific variables on the
relative utility.
The t test is used primarily to test whether a particular parameter in the model differs
from some known constant, often zero. The critical value for the test statistic is
percentile of a standardized normal distribution, which for two-tailed test at the
frequently used significance level of 0.10 is +1.65. Table 3 lists all the parameters
with absolute value of t statistics above 1.65, so we can reject the null hypothesis that
each of the parameter values is equal to zero at the 10% level of significance.
From the model estimation outputs shown in Table 3, log-likelihood at zero is
-2897.275, and log-likelihood at end is -1819.017. Then we get -2 (LL(zero) LL(end)) is 2156.516, which suggests that the combined effect of the explanatory
variables in the model is significant. Furthermore, the value of the likelihood ratio
index (rho-squared) called 2 is 0.372, which is used in the fashion similar to R2 in
regression analysis.
Followings are the discussion of the model:
(1) Females are prone to the pattern with additional stops during work (hwh+) and
the pattern with the type hwhwh+h including one ore more secondary tours.
(2) Labors tend to the simple pattern and the pattern with both a simple primary tour
and one or more secondary tours (hwh+h), while not the pattern with work-based
subtour (hw+wh) or the pattern with the type hwhwh+h including one ore more
secondary tours. Staffers prefer the pattern with subtour returning home (hwhwh),

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while self-employers are inclined to make the simple pattern.

Table 3. Commute activity pattern choice model estimation results
hwh+
hw+wh
hwhwh
hwh+h
hwhwh+h
E
t
E
T
E
t
E
t
E
t
constant
-2.636-7.13-3.068-10.59-2.500-8.19-2.553-7.39-3.204-11.69
Individual Socio-demographics
male
-1.179-3.66
-0.407-1.88
labor
0.319 1.65
-1.092-1.76
0.524 1.94 -0.820-2.26
staffer
0.556 3.51
employer
0.493 3.03
ageyoung
-0.396-2.12
ageold
-0.527-2.99-1.844-1.90
0.643 2.33
license
0.964 3.05
eduhigh
-0.943-2.56
Household Characteristics
work3
-0.394-2.16
incomelow
-0.346-1.91
incomehigh
-0.203-1.71
bike
1.042 2.87
motor
-0.286-2.010.547 2.50
car
0.695 2.65
Locational Factors
center-center -0.561-3.80
0.848 2.77 1.346 4.77
center-periphery-0.554-3.69
0.700 2.21 1.300 4.48
periphery-center
-0.841-1.88
0.577 1.91
Mode Choice
flexible
2.031 7.70 -0.427-1.660.433 1.95
non-motorized
flexible
1.557 5.52 -0.586-1.84
motorized
Work Schedule
early-early
0.740 4.19
early-late
-0.894-3.72
-2.028-2.76
late-early
-0.730-2.30
Variable

hwh
E
t

(3) Young workers dont prefer the pattern with subtour returning home (hwhwh).
And old workers are prone to the pattern with the type hwhwh+h including one ore
more secondary tours, while not the simple pattern or the pattern with additional
stops during work (hwh+).
(4) Those with driving license are more likely to make the pattern with work-based
subtour (hw+wh).
(5) Individuals with more education are less inclined to make additional stops during

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commute (hwh+).
(6) Members belonging to 3-or-more-worker household dont prefer the pattern with
subtour returning home (hwhwh).
(7) Commuters in the households having low income are not prone to the pattern
with subtour returning home (hwhwh), and those in the household having high
income do not tend to the simple pattern.
(8) Individuals in the households owning two or more bicycles show a greater
tendency to choose the pattern with additional stops during commute. And members
in the households owning motorcycles are more accessible to the pattern with both a
simple primary tour and one or more secondary tours (hwh+h), while not the pattern
with subtour returning home (hwhwh). Those in the households having cars tend to
the pattern hwh+h.
(9) Residents in the center district are more likely to make the patterns with
secondary tours including hwh+h and hwhwh+h, while not the simple pattern.
Furthermore, those both residing and working in the center district show a greater
trend than those residing in the center district but working in the periphery.
Concerning to those residing in the periphery and working in the center district, the
pattern with both a simple primary tour and one or more secondary tours (hwh+h) are
more likely to be conducted, while not the pattern with additional stops during work
(hwh+).
(10) Workers using flexible non-motorized mode tend to the pattern with subtour
returning home (hwhwh) and the pattern hwhwh+h, while not hwh+h. And those by
flexible motorized modes have greater propensity to conduct the pattern hwhwh,
while not hwh+h.
(11) Commuters who start work early or end work late are more prone to the simple
pattern, while not inclined to make the pattern with subtour returning home or
conduct secondary tours. And those who start work late and end work early are not
likely to make the pattern with work-based subtour (hw+wh).

Procedure to Apply the Discrete Activity-based Generation Model

After the calibration and explanation of the discrete activity-based trip generation
model, the utility functions of the six typical activity patterns will be given as
follows:

hwh: V1n = 0.319laborn +0.493privaten -0.527ageoldn -0.203incomehighn -0.561centercentern

-0.554centerperipheryn +0.740earlyearlyn
hwh+: V2n = -2.636-1.179malen -1.844ageoldn -0.943eduhighn +1.042biken -0.841peripherycentern
hw+ wh : V3n = -3.068 -1.092 laborn + 0.964 license n - 0.730 lateearly n

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hwhwh: V4n =-2.500+0.556staffern -0.396ageyoungn -0.394work3n -0.346incomelown -0.286motorn

+2.031flexiblenonmotorizedn +1.557flexiblemotorizedn -0.894earlylaten
hwh+h: V5n = -2.553+0.524laborn +0.547motorn +0.695carn +0.848centercentern +0.700centerperipheryn
+0.577peripherycentern -0.427flexiblenonmotorizedn -0.586flexiblemotorizedn
hwhwh+ h : V6n = -3.204 - 0.407 malen - 0.820laborn - 0.643ageold n +1.346centercentern
+1.300centerperipheryn + 0.433flexiblenonmotorizedn - 2.208earlylaten

Then the total number of each activity pattern in each zone can be aggregated by
probability method as following.

N ki = Pkn (i X kn , )

(4)

kn

where, N ki is the total number of the ith pattern in the kth zone, Pkn (i X kn , ) is the

choice probability of the ith activity pattern of the nth individual with specific
variable X kn .
Last, trip generation can be modeled by multiplying the total number of activity
pattern with its corresponding length (number of trips included as shown in table 2).
Gki = N ki Lengthi

(5)

where, Gki is the trip generation motivated by the ith activity pattern in the kth zone,
Lengthi is the number of trips included in the very ith activity pattern.
Conclusion

Trip chains which are included in activity patterns are analyzed by activity-based
travel demand forecasting method in this paper. Based on the correlation between
activity patterns and residents attributes, multinomial logit model is used to examine
how individuals choose activity patterns. In the study, the model comprehensively
considers the attributes of the individual/household socio-demographics, OD location
of work and residential zones, travel mode as well as the difference between the
activity and travel pattern resulted from the work schedule. By testing the models
whole validation and variables significance, result shows that the model ideally
explains the individuals choice behavior of activity patterns. Using the utility
function calibrated by the model, procedure to apply the discrete activity-based
generation model is brought forward in the paper. The authors hope this work will
contribute to the improvement of the behavioral-oriented travel demand modeling in
China.

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Acknowledgements

This research was funded by the National Basic Research Program (973 Program)
(2006CB705501) and National Natural Science Foundation Program (50738001)
References

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