The k-interchange-constrained diameter of a transit network: a connectedness indicator that accounts for travel convenience

We study two variants of the shortest path problem. Given an integer k, the k-color-constrained and the k-interchange-constrained shortest path problems, respectively, seek a shortest path that uses no more than k colors and one that makes no more than k-1 alternations of colors. We show that the former problem is NP-hard, when the latter is tractable. The study of these problems is motivated by some limitations in the use of diameter-based metrics to evaluate the topological structure of transit networks. We notably show that indicators such as the diameter or directness of a transit network fail to adequately account for travel convenience in measuring the connectivity of a network and propose a new network indicator, based on solving the k -interchange-constrained shortest path problem, that aims at alleviating these limitations.