Applicability of Staggered Work Hours for Urban Traffic: Case of Guangzhou

Staggered Work Hours is one of the important measures of traffic demand management. The motivation and basic principles are analyzed. Implementation of Staggered Work Hours should satisfy three basic conditions: firstly, there exists obvious peak period of travel demand, second, the flow of road traffic or public transport also have significant peaks, third, during the peak period, either road traffic or public transport is very crowded. As an example, the traffic applicability of Staggered Work Hours in the City of Guangzhou is analyzed through relevant statistics and surveys. Peak period of travel demand is obvious, bus and metro are both crowded during the peak hours. But on the contrary, the variation of road flow and speed is not obvious in downtown area, traffic operation is under high load condition during daytime. Other characteristics, such as travel distance and time changes of residents, spatial distribution of traffic congestion, and the occupational structure are also considered. In the end, a conclusion is made that in the short term, Staggered Work Hours will have positive impact on public transport condition, but bring little improvement on road condition. It's suggested that measures of Staggered Work Hours can be implemented originally within a small scope of residents, and gradually adjust according to the effects.