Macroscopic Modeling of Ride-Sourcing Systems: Regulation and Fundamental Diagram
Yafeng Yin
Civil and Environmental Engineering, and Industrial and Operations Engineering, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
ABSTRACT: Ride-sourcing companies such as Uber, Lyft, and Didi Chuxing are transforming the way people travel in cities. The companies provide ride-hailing applications that intelligently match riders to drivers; drivers are private car owners who drive their own vehicles to provide ride-for-hire services for profit. Since their advent in 2009, ride-sourcing companies have enjoyed huge success, but also created many controversies. Yin presents research findings from a series of studies conducted by the Lab for Innovative Mobility Systems (LIMOS). Yin discusses two specific issues: a macroscopic modeling framework for analyzing the ride-sourcing market and deriving insight for its regulatory policies, and then, by viewing ride-sourcing as an input/output system, Yin shows that the output rate of the ride-system system (the number of riders arriving at their destinations per unit of time) can decline with accumulation (the number of riders in the system) and how control can prevent that decline.
