Estimating the operational and service efficiency of bus transit routes using a non-radial DEA approach

Abstract

In public transportation literature, researchers increasingly tend to evaluate the service efficiency of bus transit units in addition to their operational efficiency. Evaluation of both operational and service efficiencies provides a more comprehensive performance analysis for decision-makers. This paper proposes a non-radial data envelopment analysis (DEA) approach to measure the operational and service efficiencies simultaneously. Benefits of the proposed approach are demonstrated by applying the model to assess the performance of a bus transit company's routes. The analysis results show that the proposed approach ensures optimal operational and service efficiency scores and provides applicable input targets for each route.