A variant of the current flow betweenness centrality and its application in urban networks

Abstract

The current flow betweenness centrality is a useful tool to estimate traffic status in spatial networks and, in general, to measure the intermediation of nodes in networks where the transition between them takes place in a random way. The main drawback of this centrality is its high computational cost, especially for very large networks, as it is the case of urban networks. In this paper, a new approach to the current flow betweenness centrality for its practical application in urban networks with data is presented and discussed. The new centrality measure allows the estimation of pedestrian flow developed in urban networks, taking into account both the network topology and its associated data. In addition, its computational cost makes it suitable for application in networks with a large number of nodes. Some examples are studied in order to better understand the characteristics and behaviour of the proposed centrality in the context of the city.