A maximum entropy-least squares estimator for elastic origin-destination trip matrix estimation

Research output: Contribution to journalResearch articleContributedpeer-review

Contributors

  • Chi Xie - , University of Texas at Austin (Author)
  • Kara M. Kockelman - , University of Texas at Austin (Author)
  • S. Travis Waller - , University of Texas at Austin (Author)

Abstract

In transportation subnetwork-supernetwork analysis, it is well known that the origin-destination (O-D) flow table of a subnetwork is not only determined by trip generation and distribution, but also a result from traffic routing and diversion, due to the existence of internal-external, external-internal and external-external flows. This result indicates the variable nature of subnetwork O-D flows. This paper discusses an elastic O-D flow table estimation problem for subnetwork analysis. The underlying assumption is that each cell of the subnetwork O-D flow table contains an elastic demand function rather than a fixed demand rate and the demand function can capture all traffic diversion effect under various network changes. We propose a combined maximum entropy-least squares estimator, by which O-D flows are distributed over the subnetwork in terms of the maximum entropy principle, while demand function parameters are estimated for achieving the least sum of squared estimation errors. While the estimator is powered by the classic convex combination algorithm, computational difficulties emerge within the algorithm implementation until we incorporate partial optimality conditions and a column generation procedure into the algorithmic framework. Numerical results from applying the combined estimator to a couple of subnetwork examples show that an elastic O-D flow table, when used as input for subnetwork flow evaluations, reflects network flow changes significantly better than its fixed counterpart.

Details

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1465-1482
Number of pages18
JournalTransportation Research Part B: Methodological
Volume45 `
Issue number9
Publication statusPublished - Nov 2011
Peer-reviewedYes
Externally publishedYes

External IDs

ORCID /0000-0002-2939-2090/work/141543800

Keywords

Keywords

  • Convex combination, Elastic demand, Least squares, Maximum entropy, Origin-destination trip table, Subnetwork analysis