Instances and codes for the article "Real-time optimization in urban transport systems withholding times strategies"

Real-time control strategies palliate with the day's dynamics in bus rapid transit systems. In this work, we focus on the bus bunching problem that minimizes the number of buses of the same line cruising head-to-tail or arriving at a stop simultaneously by using bus holding times at the stops. For this, we propose a new mathematical model with quadratic constraints, whose objective function minimizes the penalties caused by buses that are bunching. Experimental results on a simulation of a bus rapid transit system in Monterrey, Mexico, show the efficiency of our approach. The results show a bus bunching reduction of 45% compared to the case without optimization. Moreover, in some scenarios the passenger waiting times are reduced by 30%.