Simulating Impacts from Transit Service Enhancements in the San Francisco Bay Area

Preemptively assessing the potential impacts of large transportation projects is an essential step in achieving better outcomes. However, for transformative public transit projects, it can be difficult to weigh the many complicated downstream impacts on individual travelers in a coherent, cost-effective, and comprehensive way. This research focuses on leveraging the Behavior, Energy, Autonomy & Mobility Comprehensive Regional Evaluator (BEAM CORE) to gauge regional responses to changes in existing and planned public transit services, capturing service performance, system impacts, and users’ responses. We applied BEAM CORE to a case study in the San Francisco Bay Area to simulate the effects of recent and upcoming transit projects, showcasing its potential for transportation planning. By simulating individual traveler movements, it becomes possible to delve deeply into the equity and accessibility ramifications of transit system enhancements. The analysis of ridership, mobility, accessibility, and equity presented for this study highlights the benefits of this method in providing a clear understanding of the performances of public transit projects, facilitating more informed and efficient decision-making for transport stakeholders. The results obtained from BEAM CORE aligned closely with expectations and observed data, demonstrating its effectiveness and reliability. Finally, because of the BEAM CORE model’s responsiveness to changes in the systems, the method can in the future be applied not only to test existing or planned interventions but to a large variety of hypothetical scenarios to identify the optimal solution, including other transport modes.