A pricing model for rail passenger transportation based on passenger travel time concepts and bi-level programming

In this paper, is proposed a method for study the strategies of passenger transport pricing with bi-level programming and value of travel time. many studies about transportation is consist of bi-level programming and value of travel time, but few studies have included both of them. In this paper, the passengers are divided into some groups according to income level. As well as, a variable of comfort levels is introduced to calculate the generalized value of travel time. A pricing model which is based on the value of travel time and Bi-level programming is put forward to maximize the benefit of the railway agencies and the passenger s’ utility, which considers the passenger’s mode choice behavior with different income levels. At the end, validity of the model is evaluated by some test problems. The study results show that the model is appropriate and practical for problems of passenger transport pricing.