UTTRI Director, Professor Eric Miller participated in a two-day charrette (workshop) in Washington, DC May 24-25 on the theme of trip destination choice modelling.
Destination choice models are widely considered to be one of the weakest components of operational travel demand forecasting model systems.
The objective of the charrette was to develop a set of wiki pages documenting the current state of best practice in destination choice models. These pages will be available at the Transportation Research Board (TRB) Travel Forecasting Resources wiki at http://tfresource.org/ after passing peer review.
Eight travel demand modelling experts from the U.S., Canada and Germany, from academia and the private sector, participated in the wiki-thon. The group spent two days together in a boardroom, debating the definition of “best practice,” writing their wiki pages and critiquing the results. They all managed to survive the experience with friendships intact.
It is hoped that the wiki pages will be a useful guide to practitioners in the field, and also serve as a starting point for further improvements in the state of modelling practice.
Held at the U.S. National Academies of Science headquarters, the charrette was sponsored by the U.S. Transportation Research Board’s Committee on Travel Forecasting Resources.