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Transport models and mobile phone data
Let’s have a look first at the use of mobile phone data on our existing models. We have been operating very consistent types of transport models for the last 50 years with some more recent modest innovations. Classic transport models can operate at different levels of analysis: aggregate and disaggregate trips, tours and activities; all…
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Specifying mobile phone trip matrices
This section deals with how best to specify the desired trip matrices from mobile phone and other data. In my own experience, with our own mobile phone products and those from other suppliers, a careful specification of what is needed is key to obtain usable trip matrices. All suppliers of this type of trip matrices…
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The accuracy of mobile phone trip matrices
There have been a number of studies comparing mobile phone based trip matrices with those obtained from other sources, mostly household surveys. Just searching “validation of mobile phone trip matrices” yields a large number of papers and reports. Most of them praise the advantages of mobile phone data to generate mobility information: passive data collection,…
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The limitations of mobile phone data
Limited granularity First of all, normally, the granularity of the geo-location is limited by the size of the mobile phone cells, and the granularity of the time-stamps is limited by the frequency of the transactions between mobile phone and antennas (BTS). These two constraints make it impossible to accurately identify the start and end time…
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The nature of mobile phone data
The simplest piece of information provided by mobile phone data is the CDR (Call Detail Record). This is a data record produced by a Mobile Network Operator (MNO) that documents the details of a phone call or other telecommunications transaction (e.g. text message or data transfer from an email, web search and so on). The…
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The DNA of better trip matrices
The use of trip matrices based on mobile phone data has become a practical proposition in many countries. They are frequently used in the US from sources such as AirSage and StreetLight. They are also widely used in Spain and the UK from sources such as Telefónica and our Nommon company. Other countries currently explore…