Put the maths aside, we need to get back to basics

In the last issue we covered a new report by Yaron Hollander, a former Transport for London modelling manager, looking at ten misuses of transport models. This is one of a selection of responses from within the modelling community

Rob Bain is the founder of RBconsult, which provides technical, financial and credit expertise in the traffic, transportation and PPP sectors.

Rob Bain is the founder of RBconsult, which provides technical, financial and credit expertise in the traffic, transportation and PPP sectors.

I agree with many of Yaron Hollander’s observations.  As someone who reviews demand modelling and forecasting reports from around the world on a monthly basis I think we’ve become lost in mathematical nonsense (I nearly wrote “mathematical sophistication”, but commonly it is simply nonsense).  

At one end of the scale I come across regression equations ‘estimated’ from the flimsiest of data where fundamental model assumptions are violated,...

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