Ranking methodology to prioritize high-speed railway corridors

Abstract The purpose of this article is to create and calibrate a high-speed rail passenger traffic-based ranking model using historical high-speed rail ridership data from Spain. The existing literature is scarce, and the models used have several main issues, such as arbitrariness, and not representing the real relations of variables. These models are analysed using real-world high-speed rail data; and improved by calibration with the data. Based on the results, I demonstrate the strengths and weaknesses of these models and propose a new model by combining the strong aspects of these models. I also show the importance of intermediate cities for the estimated ridership of an HSR corridor. The study develops our understanding of the ranking models and provides a more promising ranking solution as a contribution to high-speed rail planning.