Improved feedback modeling of transport in enlarging urban areas of developing countries

Toward the common issue of quick urban sprawls of many cities in developing countries today, this research incorporates the expectation-maximization (EM) algorithm into the feedback application process of a newly developed feedback model to improve the modeling studies of the urban transport prediction and planning for the developments of the cities with their urban areas enlarged in the future. By utilizing the survey data obtained in Jabodetabek metropolitan region of Indonesia in 2002, the study results numerically confirm that the iteratively computational calibrations to the K-factors for the newly urbanized areas of a developing city by employing the EM algorithm in the feedback process can truly improve the validity of the proposed feedback model’s application to effectively predict the urban transport developments of developing cities in the future.