Preliminary Results from an Agent-Based Model of the Daily Commute in Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire, UK

Rapid economic and population growth have posed challenges to Aberdeen City and Shire in UK. Some social policies can potentially be helpful to alleviate traffic congestion and help people maintain a healthy work–life balance. In this initial model, we study the impact of flexi-time work arrangement and the construction of a new bypass on average daily commute time and CO2 emissions. We find that both flexi-time scheme and the new bypass will effectively reduce average daily commute time. Introducing a 30-min flexi-time range will reduce daily commute time by 6.5 min on average. However, further increasing flexi-time range will produce smaller saving in commute time. The new bypass will also reduce daily commute time, but only by one minute on average. As for environmental impact, introducing a 30-min flexi-time range will decrease CO2 emissions by 7 %. Not only that, it also flattens the peak emission at rush hour. The bypass, on the other hand, will increase CO2 emissions by roughly 2 %.