Urban bus traffic regulation by evolutionary algorithms

The most important disadvantage of urban bus networks (UBN) is their close dependence on diverse random phenomena that can alter the initial preestablished schedules of the buses. In fact, any changes occurring in the global urban traffic, in the demand, in the equipment or in the stuff, may certainly cause disturbances within the network traffic. Moreover, these disturbances affect the waiting time of the customers at the stops, the transit operations and also the duration of the different trips on the buses. This article deals with the traffic regulation in an UBN, especially with the transit operations. After introducing the considered disturbances, we state the different criteria that have to be optimized. The regulation approach by evolutionary algorithms is then exposed and some simulation results are presented