Flyaway Bus: GIS Analysis on Current and Potential Ridership, Revenue, and Prospective Stations

Transcription

1 ProfessorBarry Waite & Bonnie Shrewsbury Flyaway Bus: GIS Analysis on Current and Potential Ridership, Revenue, and Prospective Stations 1. Abstract The Flyaway Bus is a long distance non-stop shuttle service from and to the Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) within the Los Angeles metropolitan area. It is as normal as other airport shuttle services except for its operation by the Los Angeles World Airport (LAWA) under the City of Los Angeles. This quasi-public service has a different reason for providing airport shuttle services. In fact, the birth of Flyaway was originally considered a solution to the congestion at the airport and the surrounding neighborhoods by reducing daily traffic volume caused by tons of private vehicles. (Joon Lee, LAWA CDG Landside) Today, Flyaway has evolved into a luxurious shuttle service, serving diverse groups of interest in Los Angeles. Recently, LAWA has proposed new stations which are expected to accommodate other thousands of passengers daily. One thing requiring clarification is that, this is not a congestion analysis to see whether the solution is effective or not. Instead, this GIS analysis aims to better understand the financial performance by studying on the basic of demographics around the existing stations, the factors in determining expected ridership and how desirable the sites are for future stations. 2. Introduction The Flyaway Bus was found in 1975 and the only route traveling between LAX and VNY (Van Nuys Airport) was introduced for those who see VNY as a remote terminal to their final destinations. Along with the increasing enplanements over decades, the world s 6 th busiest international airport was called for improving ground traffic condition at and around the airport. Thus Flyaway was then considered remedy to the problem as a concept of public transit to serve mainly the passengers and employees of LAX. Today, LAWA has increased the routes to four, which are termed Van Nuys, Westwood, La Brea/Expo and Union Station and with one-way fare at $8, $10, $7 and $7, respectively. The schedules also vary from every fifteen minutes to every two hours depending on the popularity of the routes. Not only the fleet itself but also the stations 1

2 ProfessorBarry Waite & Bonnie Shrewsbury are well-selected and well-managed by planners and operators to facilitate diverse needs, such as contracted parking lots and adjacent Metro stations to satisfy riders coming with different modes. Although the core values of Flyaway Bus is to alleviate harsh traffic condition caused by the flows of private vehicles in the neighboring communities as well as the central terminal area, LAWA has proposed three new stations bounded Orange Line: Woodley Station, Santa Monica (Santa Monica Civic Center) and Hollywood (by Metro Hollywood/Vine Station) to target the tourists. This intention of revenue generation interests me to look into whether the prospective stations are well-chosen by comparing to current performance. In short, the analysis attempts to answer the following questions: Are current routes doing well in terms of finance? Do prospective sites reflect the demand or patterns of the current routes? Is there a possibility that they would lose money if new routes are open? Figure1.ExistingRoutes 2

3 ProfessorBarry Waite & Bonnie Shrewsbury 3. Methodology The GIS analysis I intend to derive are 1) an overview of surrounding demographics of existing stations to match my assumptions with its financial performance; and 2) possible attractions or points of interest, including tourist spots, hotels, parking lots, and public transit nodes, to observe and evaluate the feasibility for future operations 3.1 Assumptions Travel behavior in Los Angeles has been widely discussed due to its urban sprawl and the promotion of Transit-Oriented Development. People are often categorized by their socioeconomic status and whether they own cars. There are studies indicate that people who ride public transit are the younger generations, low to mid incomes and those who go to work. (Giuliano, 2004) Thus in this sense I transfer the idea to the ridership of Flyaway. In terms of tourist spots, hotels, and public transit nodes, I assume them to be the locations in which the main target groups are for both current and prospective routes. Parking spaces are included due to the fact that Flyaway is contracted with public lots to provide riders parking spaces at discount, such as Van Nuys Airport and UCLA campus parking in Westwood. 3.2 Retrieving Data Demographics I chose to present median household income, age distribution, and employment status by census tract within a buffer of two-mile radius where the existing stations are centered, as I assume the distance to be acceptable to attracted riders. (Figure 2) The data is retrieved from Census American Community Survey recorded from on average. Parking For parking lot locations I chose public parking lots, meters excluded, as I assume easier for legal and agreement purposes. The data is retrieved from Los Angeles Department of Transportation and the City of Santa Monica. Tourist Spots, Hotels, and Nodes of Public Transit 3

4 ProfessorBarry Waite & Bonnie Shrewsbury A 2013 updated GIS dataset conducted by Los Angeles County s Location Management System (LMS) provides points of interest comprised of points of arts and recreation, education, municipal services, shopping centers countywide. City of Santa Monica also provides data of downtown district, historic district, bike path, etc. In addition, I draw a one-mile buffer centered the existing stations to better condense the connecting subway and bus stops. Data is retrieved from Los Angeles Metropolitan Transit Authority (Metro). Flyaway Monthly Revenue The revenue data is a raw dataset permitted to use from the Landside Commercial Development Group at LAWA. Figure2.BufferscreatedinArcGIS 4

5 ProfessorBarry Waite & Bonnie Shrewsbury 3.3 Process With the data collected above, I chose City of Los Angeles as well as the city of Santa Monica boundary maps as the base map throughout the process. The current and prospective station points are drawn with the assistance of geocoding by Bonnie Shrewsbury. An updated census tract provided by Los Angeles County is in conformity with the base map and geocoded locations. Accordingly, the tracts intersecting the buffers allow me to narrow down the total number of tracts I have to retrieve from Census ACS. For other data points, I added shapefiles provided by the Metro, City of Santa Monica Information System, and Los Angeles County Chief Information Office, which allow me to capture a overview of clustering. 3.4 Limitations First, the fact that the data is collected by tract might result in a rough conclusion since some parts of the tracts are out of the buffers. Second, the lack of hotel information hinders the analysis depended on ArcGIS. Hence I roughly use the information on Google Maps by searching hotels. Even if I have collected all the data precisely, I still lack the information regarding exactly who the riders are. As the Landside Manager at LAWA mentioned, they would not know who purchase the tickets and who get on the bus but only the counts. 3.5 Findings, Analysis and Conclusion Revenue (Demand) One may argue the fare difference or the time schedule variations could contribute to the significant revenue gaps among routes. However, for the fare, the difference is diluted by the significance of ridership differences. For schedule, the difference of time interval between two buses should be assumed as in response to the demanding ridership and reflects peak and off-peak hours. The 2013 ridership and revenue (Table 1 and 2) indicates that Union Station and Van Nuys contributed at least 90% of the total ridership. This implies a relatively low demand for Westwood. The La Brea/Expo joined in Flyaway services in mid July, 2013, resulting in a 5

6 ProfessorBarry Waite & Bonnie Shrewsbury diminishing contribution to both ridership and revenue, though it is still expected to be incomparable with either Van Nuys or Union Station in Table1.2013Ridership LaBrea 605 Union 508,019 Station VanNuys 890,740 Westwood 78,030 Total 1,477,394 Table2.2013Revenue LaBrea $3,594 Union $2,487,819.1 Station VanNuys $5,941,298.1 Westwood $777,625.6 Total $9,210,336.8 Age The age distribution shows little evidence in evaluating whether the current station are well-selected sites or not in terms of ridership based on the little difference among the four. Table3.AgeDistribution AgeDistribution age LaBrea/Expo Union Station Van Nuys Westwood LA County % 33.35% 34.87% 29.61% 35.20% % 34.69% 32.66% 32.91% 29.70% % 31.97% 32.53% 37.48% 35.10% Median Household Income in the Surrounding Neighborhoods I assume here that income level and car ownership are positively co-related, and those who have higher income or own cars are less willing to take public transit, as mentioned above that Flyway Bus are assumed to follow the pattern of public transit. A significant high income group in Westwood and low around Union Station suggest that the relation between their ridership and income might theoretically follow; where income and ridership are negatively correlated. 6

7 ProfessorBarry Waite & Bonnie Shrewsbury Table4.MedianHouseholdIncome MedianHouseholdIncomeAverage LaBrea/Expo Untion Station Van Nuys Westwood LA County $52,299 $31,006 $51,662 $91,179 $56,241 Employment Status It is assumed earlier that the Flyaway Bus follows the ridership pattern of public transit. However, from Table 5 it is clear that the assumption has little evidence to make a good argument since La Brea/Expo and Westwood both accommodate high labor force in Los Angeles County. This might inspire a thought that one should carefully compare the means and ends of two modes of transportations when applying analogy. If, for example, the ends of Flyaway is for those who to catch a flight for business trips, one can say that the group of people who use public transit to go to work are distinct from whose who take business trips. Table5.EmploymentStatus:%inLaborForce(25 44YearsOld) EmploymentStatus:%inLaborForcein25 44Years Old LaBrea/Expo Union Van Westwood LA Station Nuys County 84.60% 76.30% 82.70% 81.80% 82.40% 7

8 ProfessorBarry Waite & Bonnie Shrewsbury Parking Lots and Hotels A rough data conducted from Google Maps and LADOT might express desirable evidence in selecting prospective stations. Public parking lots are good nodes for selecting future stations for the riders who drive. In fact, Santa Monica station is located in the Civic Center in which a public parking lot and a structure are right next to it. For hotels, there are clear clustering at all three prospective stations compared to the scattered points in between. Figure3.ParkingLotsandHotels 8

9 ProfessorBarry Waite & Bonnie Shrewsbury Points of Interests The different types of points include arts and recreation, shopping centers, and even public Wi-Fi spots, and retails. Although it shows little clustering around the Orange Line: Woodley Station, it is significant at Santa Monica and Hollywood, locations that gather tourists and citizens. Figure4.PointsofInterest Public Transit Nodes Last but not least, transit nodes provide clear indication for the evaluation of desirable future stations. The Hollywood station located by the Metro Red/Purple Line subway, and it is also the connection between San Fernando Valley and West, Central Los Angeles. The Orange Line: Woodley Station is by its name located at the Orange Line bus station. 9

10 ProfessorBarry Waite & Bonnie Shrewsbury The Big Blue Bus provides comprehensive bus service in and reaching outside of the City of Santa Monica. Tough this is not shown in the bus stops provided by LA Metro, one can still identify two metro buses extended into Santa Monica, which implies the popularity of the site. Figure5.PublicTransitNodes 10

11 ProfessorBarry Waite & Bonnie Shrewsbury Figure6.BigBlueBusMap(CityofSantaMonica) 11

12 ProfessorBarry Waite & Bonnie Shrewsbury Reference City of Los Angeles Department of City Planning. City Boundaries. GIS shapefile. City of Santa Monica Santa Monica Information System. City boundary, census tract, and preferential parking. GIS shapfiles. County of Los Angeles Regional Planning Department. Master Plan of Highway. GIS shapfile. County of Los Angeles Location Management System. Location/Points of Interest. GIS shapefile. Genevieve Giuliano The Geography of Urban Transportation. The Guilford Press. Los Angeles Department of Transportation Parking in LA. Map of public parking lots retrieved on Apr 5, Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority Developer Metro s Official Blog of Transit Data and Technology. Bus stops and subway stops. GIS shapefile. Los Angeles World Airport Commercial Development Group. Ground Transportation Flyaway Monthly Ridership and Revenue. Excel files. U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey Age and Sex U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey Employment Status U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey Median Income 12