The development of public transport systems presently focuses on
sustainability. In this situation, the issue of user (passenger) migration
has become important to the transport company as a service provider.
This paper presents an integrated model of the operational risk of vehicle
incapacity, including the following: costs of incidental repairs, costs of
unplanned downtime and costs resulting from potential user migration.
The paper presents the results of operational research on buses of two
makes over a period of 6 years, in the mileage range of 0–420 000 km.
The authors have determined the risk as a regression function of
operational mileage to estimate the optimum life cycle. The quality of
the vehicle was assessed using the criterion of the maximum cost of the
operational incapacity risk being equal to the current residual value of
the vehicle. The research results confirmed the suitability of the
integrated risk model for a comparison of vehicle makes and assessment
of their reasonably foreseeable life cycle in a balanced carrier-vehicleuser system.