Importance Factor (IF)

So, what is being done here is trying to find Importance Factor of each station and which will help us find the comfort factor of a route.

So what and how to find the importance factor of a metro station?

Here are few properties that may determine Importance Factor (IF):

  1. Population in the station area
  2. Offices in the station area
  3. Restaurants (food joints)
  4. Entertaiment sources (Movie Theatres, Malls, Game Zones)
  5. Educational Institutions
  6. Amenities (Hospitals, Parks)

IF is directyly propertional to CF (Comfort Factor)

Population - Why and How it determines IF?

Let say people entering metro at a particular station is IN. And, people coming out of the metro at a particular station is OUT.

Now IN and OUT are directly propertional to CF and thus, IF.

Now, people entering and exiting means population entering and exiting. A larger population at a station means more commute in general. Hence IN and OUT is the population factor.

Now, Population is directly propertional to IF, i.e IF = c1*(Population), where c1 is a constant.

Offices

Offices determine more people getting out of the metro at that station to go their offices and enter metro after leaving the offices.

Thus, offices directyly propertional to IF

IF = k1*(Offices), where k1 is a function of time.

k1 = k1(t)

This is because people generally come to offices in the morning and leave in the evening. That means more people exiting that metro station in the morning and more people entering the metro station in the evening.

Here is a time graph of k1 determined after doing a polynomial regression analysis on some dataset.

_images/offices.png

Restaurants

Same reason as Offices.

IF = k2*(Restaurants), where k2 is a function of time.

k2 = k2(t)

Here is a time graph of k2 determined after doing a polynomial regression analysis on some dataset.

_images/restaurants.png

Entertaiment Sources

Same reason as Offices.

IF = k3*(Entertaiment_Sources), where k3 is a function of time.

k3 = k3(t)

Here is a time graph of k3 determined after doing a polynomial regression analysis on some dataset.

_images/entertainment.png

Educational Institutions

Same reason as Offices.

IF = k4*(Educational_Institutions), where k4 is a function of time.

k4 = k4(t)

Here is a time graph of k4 determined after doing a polynomial regression analysis on some dataset.

_images/educationInstitutions.png

Amenities (Hospitals)

Same reason as Population.

IF = c2*(Amenities), where c2 is a constant.

This is because need for ameneties like hospitals does not depend on time. Hence time cannot influece the factor, but more ameneties near a metro station means more commuters enter/exit that station on average. Thus the IF.