Alleviating a subway bottleneck through a platform gate

Abstract

This paper shows the results of an experiment in which a gate allowing only unidirectional flows was installed on the middle of a Metro platform. The results were very positive: operation of the Metro Line was improved, travel times were reduced, and both regularity and frequency of trains increased. Finally, the perception of the service by its riders also saw an improvement. The main cause of this impact is that the gate encourages riders to arrange themselves more efficiently on board the train allowing the platform to clear much more quickly. A video about the intervention can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2PcgDt4cFs.