Control of bus headways by traffic signal timing methods

Bus bunching causes uneven passenger loadings and increases the average passenger waiting time. Bunching is caused by an unstable relationship between delay in the actual bus arrival time and passenger loading time requirements. An appropriate mathematical representation of this process is provided, and the general mathematical requirements for stabilizing the process is described. It is shown how if the time of arrival is known at certain locations, the traffic signals may be appropriately timed to remove this instability and enable the buses to adhere to their schedule with greater precision. An example demonstrating the performance of the algorithm on a particular bus route is provided.