Travel planner-full

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Daily Activity and Multimodal Travel Planner: Phase II Final Report

Ryuichi Kitamura, Cynthia Chen, Jiayu Chen

Abstract
It is important that our travel be organized in an efficient way. One way to achieve this is to provide travelers with a trip planner that produces efficient travel itineraries for them. It is desired that a trip planner possess the following features in order to be useful: be able to handle multiple destinations, multiple constraints, and multiple modes; and be able to adjust travelers' preferences under different circumstances. These features cannot be found in existing trip planners.

The goal is then to develop an "Itinerary Planner" that possesses all of these features. The Itinerary Planner attempts to identify the most desirable itinerary from among all feasible alternatives. The desirability of an itinerary is measured by an objective function, which is defined a weighted sum of seven criteria (i.e., attributes of the itinerary), The weights represent travelers' preferences to the attributes (e.g., total travel time and monetary cost). The Itinerary Planner first uses initial values of the preference weights established in a previous study in the Bay Area. After a series of operations, the Planner selects the two "best" itineraries which have the best and the second best objective function values. Then, the Planner presents the selected itineraries to the traveler. If the traveler is not satisfied with either itinerary, the Planner asks the traveler to indicate the itinerary that they prefer to the other. Based on the selection made by the user, the Planner updates the preference weights and re-selects another two itineraries. This process is repeated until the traveler is satisfied with one of the selected itineraries.

A prototype is developed for downtown San Francisco. It is demonstrated that the Planner is capable of effectively generating alternative itineraries for a tour that involves multiple trips and multiple modes, with complex constraints, and that the Planner prototype serves as a practical tool for travelers in itinerary planning.

Introduction
Since our movement is restricted by the amount of available time and the travel speed, it is important that our travel be efficiently organized such that the time resource can be best utilized to engage in activities in an efficient manner. One way to achieve this goal is by developing efficient travel itineraries. The objective of this project is to develop such a tool that can assist the traveler in developing an efficient itinerary in which multiple locations can be visited with minimal waste.

Also in the scope of this project is the development of an information system that will aid the traveler in using public transit in a complex tour in which multiple locations are visited. Underlying this are the beliefs that the availability of information affects the decision to use public transit, and that people will make complex tours by public transit if they are shown that it is possible and convenient to do so.

These considerations have motivated the "Itinerary Planner," computer software that assists the traveler by proposing to him/her efficient itineraries for visiting multiple locations using alternative travel modes. Given the set of locations the traveler wishes to visit and the constraints associated with the visits, the Itinerary Planner develops alternative itineraries for the visits interactively with the traveler, or, the user. The planner presents alternative itineraries to the user, and the user indicates the Planner which itinerary is more preferable. The planner in turn takes the feedback from the user and updates its objective function to better reflect the user's preferences, then generates another set of itineraries. This process is iterated until a satisfactory itinerary is found.

Conclusion

The Itinerary Planner developed in this project is one of the first travel planning tools that incorporate multiple destinations, multiple objectives and constraints, and multiple modes of travel. It is also one of the first travel planners that bring the user into the itinerary development process and continuously adjust the objective function used to evaluate alternative itineraries such that the userÕs preferences can be best reflected in selecting an itinerary.

The development of the Itinerary Planner thus represents an ambitious effort to incorporate the many novel features into one software package for travel planning assistance. The Planner prototype developed in this project, however, is still in its prototype stage and unavoidably exhibits certain limitations. In particular, it has not been extensively tested. Some of the concepts and algorithms that have been introduced into the prototype need to be tested and refined. The user-interface has room for improvement; data bases for different types of opportunities (e.g., hotels, restaurants, banks) are desired such that the user can find where to go by keying in the desired type of opportunity; and the method of updating the objective function should be rigorously tested and improved. Despite these limitations, it is believed that the project has shown the Planner is an effective tool that can help travelers organize their itineraries in an efficient manner while observing many constraints that may exist. It is expected that the Planner will provide not only personal benefits to the user but also social benefits through increased transit use and reduced traffic congestion.

Full Report: UCB-ITS-PRR-99-1 (1 MB PDF file)