Passenger-centric timetable rescheduling: A user equilibrium approach

Unexpected disruptions commonly occur in the railway network, causing delays, and extra cost for operators and inconvenience for passengers by missing their connection and facing overcrowded trains. This paper presents a passenger-centric approach for timetable rescheduling in case of disruption. We study a railway system in which passengers are free to choose their itinerary and compete over limited train capacity. We explicitly model the passengers’ decisions using a choice model. We propose a multi-objective algorithmic approach to solve the problem. Service punctuality, operating cost, and passengers’ inconvenience are selected as objectives. Computational experiments are performed on the Swiss and Dutch railway networks. The results demonstrate the performance of the algorithm in finding high-quality solutions in a computationally efficient manner.