# A GIS-Based Analysis of the Light Rail Transit Systems in Spain
## 6 Conclusions  
The study reported here proposed the characterization of the LRT systems operating in Spain by determining the values of a series of parameters associated with city geometry, potential and daily users, users per station, acceptance rate, density of catchment areas, or passengers per unit line. Data has been obtained by using QGIS software, and also after research on the official census and on the operator's annual reports. The main result is the data range obtained. These values show the geometrical picture of the LRT schemes concerning lines, stations and users. These data could be useful in future studies and preliminary projects carried out in other Spanish cities interested in introducing an LRT in their urban grid, and also for comparison with LRT in other countries. As seen in the literature review section, some LRT systems planned in different Spanish cities were finally cancelled due to doubts on the final success of the infrastructure. Moreover, questions concerning the access distances to and from the stations, transfer penalties or oversized projects (and therefore economically unviable) have been set as the main problems related to failed projects. In the analysis, clear differences between the Zaragoza and Murcia LRT success have been exposed, and variances on geometrical values have emerged. Furthermore, results have also proved the differences between cities with LRT as main transportation system, and cities whose LRT scheme complements the subway net: data results are dissimilar in these two circumstances, and also transfer stations works different. Finally, the research has stablished a method and a group of parameters to define LRTs. The limitations of this study that should be mentioned are, first, those associated with the sample size which is not very large. A larger sample could reinforce our conclusions. At the same time, other studies on LRTs mentioned at the beginning of this article, are limited to two [14], three [7] and five cases [50], so actually this study is quite complete by comparing to others. It would also be of interest to study the relationship of LRTs to other transportation networks, such as commuter trains or city and metropolitan buses, or ride car parks. Future work could be in three directions. First, other technical parameters, such as those associated with service quality, could be studied. In this group, stations (roofed or not, seating space, real information on traffic), commercial speed, the distance of the LRT to points of interest in the city, schedules and frequencies, number of seats per vehicle, etc. Second, comparative studies with LRTs in other countries could be carried out to evaluate any similarities or differences. For example, we compared the results of our study with the one on the Turkish LRT carried out several years ago [50], which had some parameters in common with ours (Table 6). Thus, in Turkey, daily service users of the smallest system (Samsum) exceeded 20,000, compared to 5000, 7000 or 9000 in some systems in Spain. The users per station varied in Turkey from 995 to 5700, while only in Barcelona, Seville, Tenerife and Zaragoza did they surpass 995. The stations in Turkey were somewhat farther apart than in Spain (although not by much), and the ratio of riders per unit line varied from 0.75 and 5.09 in Turkey, compared to the range of 0.10 to 2.20 in Spain, where only the systems in Barcelona, Seville, Tenerife and Zaragoza surpass those 0.75 minimums. Apparently, therefore, the Turkish systems are more successful insofar as capturing passengers, although one basic point missing to be able to compare these parameters with more assurance is the population density in the systems' capture areas. Thirdly and lastly, research on the influence of a new LRT in tourism figures (as explained above, LRT cultivates an image of the city as progressive and modern), in the labor market, in the generation of new business or even in the expansion of new residential neighborhoods could be quantified.