Sensitivity of accessibility measurements to the underlying transport network model

Abstract

The accessibility of the Swiss municipalities has changed substantially in the last 50 years due to the extension of the road network, the improvements of the public transport and the population growth.The paper deals with the first two variables and shows the effects of the level of detail of the transport models on the results.Three models of increasing complexity are compared.The methodological comparison has shown that it is sufficient to trace the development of the high-capacity road system for a national level analysis.It is also recommendable to use assignment methods for the calculation of the travel times, as it is very difficult to differentiate the assumption about mean speeds by region.The ratio of road-based to public transport-based accessibility has changed a little in the time period from 1950 to 2000 in Switzerland.