Analysis of electronic transit farecard data can provide insight into how travelers use the system and how their behavior changes as both the urban form and transit services change over time. It can be used to answer a variety of policy questions, ranging from the impacts of adopted policies on transit use, to the quantity and quality of trips taken, to the differences in transit services provided to neighborhoods of different income levels to determine the equity of transit services provided throughout the region.  The Next Generation One Regional Card for All (NG ORCA) effort includes the development and deployment of a database system called DARe (Data Access and Reporting), which is being used to collect, manage, and store data on the use of ORCA cards and accounts. However, to date transit agency analysts have not fully taken advantage of its reporting function. The UW has an ORCA data reporting system that currently houses data from January 2019 through May 2022. This project is funding continued improvements to the UW system.

Principal Investigator: Ryan Avery, Washington State Transportation Center, UW
Sponsor: King County Metro
Metro Technical Monitor: Melissa Gaughan
Scheduled completion: September 2023

Emerging technologies such as automated vehicles, advanced data analytics and machine learning, and on-demand ride services will not only fundamentally alter the transportation landscape but will provide new data that can be used for transportation planning and analysis. This project is examining the properties of these new data and identifying potential applications. Phase I developed a preliminary framework for integrating emerging and conventional data from diverse sources. Using the Seattle SR 99 Tunnel Tolling Project as a case study, Phase II began to demonstrate the value of emerging big data (more specifically, app-based data) and their fusion with data from other, conventional sources in evaluating a project’s impact on transportation system performance and in answering critical and time-sensitive planning and policy-related questions. This continuation of Phase II will focus on investigating other potential future data sources, such as transportation network companies, insurance providers, and automakers, and on sharing methodologies created for data processing, origin/destination estimation, and validation. The researchers will make all work open source in order to help state, regional, and local agencies better coordinate among agencies and with data providers.

Principal Investigators:
Jeff Ban, Civil and Environmental Engineering, UW
Cynthia Chen, Civil and Environmental Engineering, UW

Sponsor: WSDOT
WSDOT Technical Monitor: Natarajan Janarthanan
WSDOT Project Manager: Doug Brodin
Scheduled completion: December 2023