Determining Spatial Parameters

About

Brief Description: An Excel-based spreadsheet model, making use of pedestrian level-of-service indicators for the determination of spatial parameters on railway stations.   Target Market: Consulting engineering field, railroad authorities, and railway station architects.   Value proposition/ Benefits: This product provides accurate first-order SP results, which up until now have been based on heuristic rules of thumb. These heuristic practices can produce negative results especially when considering pedestrian dynamics on railway stations, either by being inconvenient for users (under designing) or very expensive (over designing) both to the detriment of the clients.   Unique Characteristics: This product provides accurate first-order SP results. These allow architects to proceed with more confidence in their conceptual designs which will ultimately be tested with microscopic pedestrian modelling techniques. The result therefore significantly reduces the design iteration process in the first-order design stage.   Technical Description: It was not the intention of this PhD research to develop a fully-fledged commercial model for widespread application, but only to demonstrate that a simple (mesoscopic-based) spreadsheet model can provide results comparative with microscopic modelling results. Though the SP model does not replace the microscopic modelling design process, it nevertheless enables designers to use the output to produce first-order designs and/or to enable decision makers to submit either first-order or final designs to elementary design tests.