Section2 Advanced Road Traffic Services

With the growth of motor vehicle ownership, bus users in Nakamura City in Kochi Prefecture are decreasing year after year. The major reasons for this are long traveling time to the destination due to many detours and long waiting times.

In order to promote the use of buses, the operation of "Nakamura machi-bus," a demand-responsive bus system, using the grid road network in Nakamura City, which is called "little Kyoto" in the Tosa Region, was started. The experimental operation of this bus system lasted from 10 April to 30 June 2000. In this system, buses are operated according to the actual demand. The users inform the bus operator of their desired boarding time, and boarding and leaving stops by telephone, fax, and information terminal. The information sent is processed by computer based on such data as the already-set operation schedule, and the users receive a time table close to their desired boarding time. The number of bus stops has been increased from 27 to 57. One of the new stops is close to a hospital, which allows users to wait for a bus in its lobby. The system greatly improves the convenience, and the number of bus users has increased to four times that before system introduction. Due to this success, a full-scale operation with extended service hours started from July 1, 2000.