Fostering sustainable urban mobility via stakeholder engagement: A novel analytic hierarchy process and half-quadratic programming

Ameliorating the public transport system is the top priority for legislators and planners alike. But to implement effective and long-lasting solutions, they must take into account not only the viewpoint of decision-makers on better solutions but also the necessity of including the public in the process of evolution. To estimate the public transport system in the Turkish city of Mersin, our article takes into account the opinions of users, non-users, and decision-makers. The methodology utilised in this study involves the application of the Analytic Hierarchy Process to ascertain the degree of significance assigned to the associated criteria concerning the supply quality of the public bus transport system. Additionally, the half-quadratic programming has been utilised to compute the final ranking that is combined for each of the participating groups. The main findings spotted the transport quality and tractability as paramount criteria, emphasizing their universal importance. In addition, a consensus index and a trust level for the combined ranking are provided by the recently proposed framework.