Can Decision Making Processes Benefit from a User Friendly Land Use and Transport Interaction Model

Policy instruments, Flight simulator Abstract: transport and land use developments. Decision making in this context is a challenging task which was explored in detail in a series of research projects. To support decision making, tools were developed to reduce the risk of inappropriate decisions in the land use and transport context. One of these tools is MARS (Metropolitan Activity Relocation Simulator); an integrated dynamic land use and transport model. The paper presented here focuses therefore on two main issues: 1) the introduction of the decision support tool MARS and of the cause-effect relations between the land-use and the transport system implemented within MARS and 2) the design and application of the MARS flight simulator (MARS FS) as a graphical user interface for MARS especially designed to the needs of decision makers. Urban regions today face serious challenges caused by past and ongoing Land-use and transport model, Dynamic modelling, Decision-making support,