Copyright © 2012 Zhong-hua Wei et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

The improved bacterial foraging algorithm was applied in this paper to schedule the bus departing interval. Optimal interval can decrease the total operation cost and passengers’ mean waiting time. The principles of colony sensing, chemotactic action, and improved foraging strategy made this algorithm adaptive. Based on adaptive bacteria foraging algorithm (ABFA), a model on one bus line in Hohhot city in China was established and simulated. Two other algorithms, original bacteria foraging algorithm (BFA) and genetic algorithm (GA), were also used in this model to decide which one could greatly accelerate convergence speed, improve searching precision, and strengthen robustness. The final result showed that ABFA was most feasible in optimizing variables.