ABSTRACT
Public transport planning is conventionally divided into strategic, tactical and operational decision making. Each planning level involves the consideration of a different decision horizon, geographical scope and performance indicators. Furthermore, the different planning levels entail different planning and modelling issues. For example, strategic network design requires estimating future demand levels and forecasting the distribution of passenger fl ows over the network, whereas tactical planning involves solving large-scale crew and fl eet scheduling requirements. While effective strategic and tactical planning are critical for service performance, the uncertainty associated with the public transport operation environment leads to a discrepancy between planning and operations.
