Abstract
In developing countries, regional economic growth has led to rising individual prosperity, prompting a shift toward private transportation. This preference is often driven by relatively minor issues in public transit, such as poor schedule coordination or inadequate connectivity, resulting in increased congestion, pollution, and inefficient resource use. This study focuses on enhancing public transport usage by optimizing last-mile connectivity and ensuring time reliability— critical for attracting regular railway passengers. The goal is to enable seamless access between railway stations and nearby urban or rural nodes through better integration of Multimodal Transportation (MMT) with Gujarat State Road Transport Corporation (GSRTC) bus services. By aligning existing GSRTC schedules—without modifying their core timetables—with railway operations and introducing targeted feeder buses, last-mile gaps can be addressed for approximately 70% of daily train services. 30% of the train can not be included due to lack of bus connections in early morning or late-night. Multimodal transportation shows substantial benefits: bus occupancy increases more than 4 times, while the dependence on private vehicles decreases significantly—four-wheelers (↓57%), autos (↓78%), and two-wheelers (↓50%). This mode shift also yields a 53.33% cost reduction for passengers travelling through cars, 72% for two-wheelers, and 68% for autos, alongside significant emission reductions and promote environmental conservation: CO₂ (↓30.2%), CH₄ (↓52.49%), CO (↓55.69%), N₂O (↓16.72%), NO₂ (↓34.22%), NH₃ (↓41.53%), SO₂ (↓40.63%), VOC (↓33.19%) and TSP (↓31.07%).
Keywords: Bus Occupancy, Emission Reductions, Feeder Buses, Last-mile Connectivity, Multimodal Transportation, Seamless Access