Ship Behavior in Ports and Waterways: An Empirical Perspective

As one of the most important freight transportation modes, maritime transport has been the backbone of international trade and global economy. From the cargo flow point of view, seaports and inland shipping link the individual countries and the global waterborne transportation networks. To analyze the current ship traffic and port performance or...

Mind your passenger!: The passenger capacity of platforms at railway stations in the Netherlands

This thesis constitutes a first step towards measuring the passenger capacity of station platforms. First, it defines platform capacity on the basis of the locations of queues at exit escalators from platforms, the presence of passengers in the platform-edge danger zone and the duration of stops. It then renders capacity measurable using real...

A Multiscale View on Bikeability of Urban Networks

Although many agree that the use of bicycles improves mobility and quality of life in a city, much less clear is how to assess the progress being made in this direction and how to plan bikeable cities. The bikeability of a city depends on many diverse and interrelated factors such as the land use and transport system, culture and social norms,...

Cyclists in Motion: from data collection to behavioural models

As the title suggests, cyclists are the main topic of this dissertation<br/>and more specifically, their behaviour while they are ‘in motion’. The<br/>term ‘in motion’ is used in the title to represent microscopic operational<br/>cycling behaviour, which is the behaviour of cyclists, treated as individuals<br/>(microscopic level), while they are...

Spatial Activity-Travel Patterns of Cyclists

Knowledge about the way how the bicycle is used for activity participation is still scarce. This thesis provides empirical insights into typical activity-travel behaviour of cyclists. A special focus is put on the spatial dimension of activity-travelling by bicycle and its determinants. The findings can be used to design more bicycle-friendly...

Using Social Media to Characterise Crowds in City Events for Crowd Management

Using social media data, such as Twitter and Instagram, I identify relevant information, develop data models, estimate and analyse crowds’ characteristics in city events, including demographic and city-role composition, Spatial-temporal distribution, sentiment estimation, Points of Interest preferences, word use, crowd size and density...

Vessel Route Choice Model and Operational Model based on Optimal Control

Modeling is a promising approach to understand and predict the safety and efficiency of maritime traffic in ports and waterways. Different types of models have been developed over the years. Nevertheless, several important scientific challenges still remain. For instance, few models consider vessel behavior in ports and waterways under the...

Assessment of Capacity and Risk: A Framework for Vessel Traffic in Ports

Vessel traffic in ports is a key issue due to the high increase in vessel flows that lead to busier waterways. This dissertation presents novel methodologies to assess vessel traffic in ports based on capacity and risk independently and jointly. These methodologies have been applied to case studies using simulation models and AIS data. They...

Microscopic modelling of walking behaviour

How to model and simulate large pedestrian facilities accurately? This dissertation answers this question by analysing current pedestrian models and expanding one. The developed model (Nomad) describes pedestrians as individuals that minimise walking efforts. The model is expanded including behaviours that correspond to activities performed in...

Analysis and Modelling of Pedestrian Movement Dynamics at Large-scale Events

To what extent can we model the movements of pedestrians who walk across a large-scale event terrain? This dissertation answers this question by analysing the operational movement dynamics of pedestrians in crowds at several large music and sport events in the Netherlands and extracting the key crowd movement phenomena. A conceptual model and an...

Pedestrian Dynamics at Transit Stations: An Integrated Pedestrian Flow Modelling Approach

The objective of this chapter is to explore an integrated modelling framework that captures pedestrian walking behaviour in congested and uncongested conditions and covers different traffic dynamics caused by complex geometric and operational characteristics such as those observed in transit stations. The integrated modelling framework is built...

Nautical traffic modelling for safe and efficient ports

Methodology to assess ports and waterways on safety and capacity (poster + abstract)