Edges as Nodes - a New Approach to Timetable Information

In this paper we suggest a new approach to timetable information by introducing the ``edge-converted graph'' of a timetable. Using this model we present simple algorithms that solve the earliest arrival problem (EAP) and the minimum number of transfers problem (MNTP). For constant-degree graphs this yields linear-time algorithms for EAP and MNTP which improves upon the known \emph{Dijkstra}-based approaches. We also test the performance of our algorithms against the classical algorithms for EAP and MNTP in the time-expanded model.