Research on the accessibility of the entire travel process using public transportation in mountainous cities: Taking the central urban area of Chongqing as an example, China

The accessibility of the entire travel process using public transportation refers to the convenience of the entire travel process from the starting point to the destination when residents choose public transport as the travel tool. However, there is currently a lack of research on the full process of public transportation travel for residents, especially in mountainous cities with complex terrain and high manual intervention intensity. Taking the central urban area of Chongqing, China as the study area, this research uses geographic information spatial analysis and complex network analysis technology to build a full process accessibility evaluation model for public transport and excavates the distribution law of accessibility in the full process of public transport travel in mountainous cities and its correlation with terrain, walking road density, population density and other influencing factors. The research shows that: (1) The coverage rate of transfer between rail transit and conventional public transportation within 400 meters of the research area reaches 100%; (2) The average proportion of the actual walking area of stations within the study area is only 40.36% of the ideal walking area, with 16.69% of walking routes having a high degree of detour and 11.39% of walking routes having a very serious degree of detour, almost unreachable; (3) The convenience of inter station transfer in the public transportation system within the research area is poor, with a current probability of direct arrival of only 0.84%. The cumulative probability of direct arrival or single transfer arrival is only 9.64%, and the average number of transfers is 2.9. The main transfer stations and core hub stations are few and unevenly distributed, with almost no gradient configuration used for stations with transfer functions, greatly affecting the convenience of the entire process of public transportation travel; (4) There is varying degrees of correlation between the full process accessibility of regional public transportation stations and the four main influencing factors of station location, including altitude, slope, pedestrian density, and population density. Among them, the density of pedestrian roads has the most significant correlation with the full process accessibility of stations, becoming the main factor restricting the convenience of public transportation in mountainous cities, The density of pedestrian roads is mainly constrained by mountain terrain factors such as altitude differences and slopes at the micro scale. The research conclusion can provide scientific basis for the integrated construction and development of public transportation in mountainous cities at both macro and micro scales, guide the adaptation of population and public transportation, and improve the travel sharing rate of public transportation.