Constrained Recursive Logit for Route Choice Analysis

Abstract: The recursive logit (RL) model has become a widely used framework for route choice modeling, but it suffers from a key limitation: it assigns nonzero probabilities to all paths in the network, including those that are unrealistic, such as routes exceeding travel time deadlines or violating energy constraints. To address this gap, we propose a novel Constrained Recursive Logit (CRL) model that explicitly incorporates feasibility constraints into the RL framework. CRL retains the main advantages of RL-no path sampling and ease of prediction-but systematically excludes infeasible paths from the universal choice set. The model is inherently non-Markovian; to address this, we develop a tractable estimation approach based on extending the state space, which restores the Markov property and enables estimation using standard value iteration methods. We prove that our estimation method admits a unique solution under positive discrete costs and establish its equivalence to a multinomial logit model defined over restricted universal path choice sets. Empirical experiments on synthetic and real networks demonstrate that CRL improves behavioral realism and estimation stability, particularly in cyclic networks.