Sudeshna Mitra | Indian institute of technology (original) (raw)
Papers by Sudeshna Mitra
There is considerable research on adverse weather events such as fog, rainfall and snowfall on tr... more There is considerable research on adverse weather events such as fog, rainfall and snowfall on traffic operations and safety, since these environmental conditions either affect visibility or degrade pavement friction—thereby affecting safety and operations of traffic movement. Although bright sunny days appear to be ideal for driving, sun glare could be detrimental to traffic safety and pose serious driving hazards. With data from signalized intersections of Tucson, Arizona, an empirical investigation is performed here to assess how sun glare affects intersection safety. The task is performed by comparing and contrasting crashes that are possibly affected by morning and evening sun-glare with those that are unaffected by glare. Sun rise and sun set data, obtained from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) is used and windows of worst possible glare are computed. Crashes along the east bound directions in the morning and those along the west during the evening glare window are tested to check if sun glare possibly influences crash occurrence. Analysis of the trends and patterns of glare crashes and the outcome of the statistical tests show some evidence that sun glare affects intersection crash occurrence. Results indicate that odds of glare crash occurrence are higher in east and west bound compared to north and south bound directions. Adverse effect of glare is found to be greater in early spring, fall and in winter compared to summer months. There is some evidence that rear-end and angle crashes at signalized intersections are affected by sun glare.
2015 IEEE 18th International Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems, 2015
Springer Environmental Science and Engineering, 2013
Proceedings of the International Symposium on Engineering under Uncertainty: Safety Assessment and Management (ISEUSAM - 2012), 2012
2014 9th International Conference on Industrial and Information Systems (ICIIS), 2014
... HERTWIG, President, CSX Intermodal, Jacksonville, FL GLORIA JEAN JEFF, Director, Michigan DOT... more ... HERTWIG, President, CSX Intermodal, Jacksonville, FL GLORIA JEAN JEFF, Director, Michigan DOT ADIB K. KANAFANI, Cahill Professor of ... Tampa, FL CARMINE PALOMBO, Southeast Michigan Council of Governments JILL L. HOCHMAN, FHWA Liaison LORRIE LAU, FHWA ...
Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board, 2015
Driving in fog is a challenging task. ITS application through Changeable Message Sign (CMS) is on... more Driving in fog is a challenging task. ITS application through Changeable Message Sign (CMS) is one of the popular ways to assist drivers in fog. However, an evaluation done on California's Automated Warning System (CAWS) showed that "a generic advisory speed" for a traffic stream is not effective in modifying driver's behavior for better safety. On the other hand existing literature shows that "in-vehicle headway feedback" may be effective in modifying driver behavior. However, to provide such feedback, it is essential to build understanding about safe headways in various visibility conditions. Estimate of such safe headways may be obtained by analyzing drivers' car-following behavior in reduced visibility. In this study real life data on fog driving, containing records such as time of arrival and departure, speed, headway and vehicle lengths are used to study driver's headway maintenance with speed. Investigation is done to check headway variatio...
Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2013
Case Studies on Transport Policy, 2014
ABSTRACT With increasing concern about global warming, greenhouse gas emissions and rising fuel p... more ABSTRACT With increasing concern about global warming, greenhouse gas emissions and rising fuel prices, non-motorized modes, such as bicycle are gaining importance as viable mode in urban transportation worldwide. In small sized Indian cities non-motorized transportation accounts for over two thirds of all trips, but with increase in purchasing power and affordability, Indian commuters are leaning towards motorized private modes leading to a rapid growth in motorized vehicle population and thus increasingly congested roadways and urban air pollution. At this juncture it is very important to investigate that what influences people's mode choice in general and bicycle mode choice in particular. This study has identified specific attitudinal attributes related to Physical factors, Psychological factors, Travel Time sensitivity, Economic aspects, Congestion, Parking, Route or Link level facilities, Route topography, Safety related factors, Security related factor, Environmental awareness and Weather related factors. A travel behavior survey with questionnaire designed to address these attributes was conducted to understand user's attitude toward bicycling in a small Indian city. The survey outcomes were then used in Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA), which revealed Perceived Benefits, Physical Barriers, Safety Hazard, Social Barriers, and Road Condition to be the major factor classes influencing bicycle mode choice. In order to compare user perception with expert perception, a pair wise comparison using Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) has also been performed on factors related to user- specific, route related and journey-related components. The results reveal physical factors, safety related concerns and route topography to be the key and common set of parameters influencing bicycle choice both from the user's and as well as expert's point of view
Journal of Transportation Safety & Security, 2014
ABSTRACT In the absence of geometric design and traffic data, hot-spot identification (HSID) is d... more ABSTRACT In the absence of geometric design and traffic data, hot-spot identification (HSID) is done primarily with crash data only, based on techniques such as crash frequency (CF), fatal crash frequency (FCF), or equivalent property damage only (EPDO), despite the known limitations of these techniques. In this article, the authors propose an improved HSID technique that may be used with crash data only. Using disaggregate crash history information, this method estimates probabilities of crash severities by the major contributing factors using severity models. These probabilities are used to compute expected numbers of severe and fatal crashes at various locations which are then used to classify the locations into two fuzzy cluster, namely hotspot and non-hotspot using Fuzzy C-Means (FCM) algorithm. The identified hotspots are ranked based on their mean departure from the core of the hotspot cluster. These rankings are compared with rankings done using existing techniques namely CF, FCF, EPDO, and Empirical Bayes’ (EB). The proposed method is found to be a robust method for hotspot detection with performance better than existing methods that use crash data only and comparable to the EB method.
Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2013
Accident Analysis & Prevention, 2012
Many local jurisdictions seek to preserve adequate infrastructure by enacting level of service (L... more Many local jurisdictions seek to preserve adequate infrastructure by enacting level of service (LOS) policies for proposed new development. Understanding the relationship between roadway LOS policies and greenhouse gas emissions is an important step towards reducing the emissions related to global climate change. By influencing the evolution of urban infrastructure, these LOS standards can have a significant impact on the type and character of vehicle trips made and the subsequent emissions released. Currently, most jurisdictions establish LOS threshold policies based solely on operational standards and rarely consider the impacts of greenhouse gas emissions.Using a travel demand forecasting model for Grover Beach, CA, buildout conditions were simulated to make the network have operational deficiencies in critical areas, ultimately operating at a LOS F. Changes to roadway lane configurations were then made to achieve LOS thresholds of LOS E through LOS A. The resulting speed and flo...
City and Regional …, 2009
There is considerable research on adverse weather events such as fog, rainfall and snowfall on tr... more There is considerable research on adverse weather events such as fog, rainfall and snowfall on traffic operations and safety, since these environmental conditions either affect visibility or degrade pavement friction—thereby affecting safety and operations of traffic movement. Although bright sunny days appear to be ideal for driving, sun glare could be detrimental to traffic safety and pose serious driving hazards. With data from signalized intersections of Tucson, Arizona, an empirical investigation is performed here to assess how sun glare affects intersection safety. The task is performed by comparing and contrasting crashes that are possibly affected by morning and evening sun-glare with those that are unaffected by glare. Sun rise and sun set data, obtained from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) is used and windows of worst possible glare are computed. Crashes along the east bound directions in the morning and those along the west during the evening glare window are tested to check if sun glare possibly influences crash occurrence. Analysis of the trends and patterns of glare crashes and the outcome of the statistical tests show some evidence that sun glare affects intersection crash occurrence. Results indicate that odds of glare crash occurrence are higher in east and west bound compared to north and south bound directions. Adverse effect of glare is found to be greater in early spring, fall and in winter compared to summer months. There is some evidence that rear-end and angle crashes at signalized intersections are affected by sun glare.
2015 IEEE 18th International Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems, 2015
Springer Environmental Science and Engineering, 2013
Proceedings of the International Symposium on Engineering under Uncertainty: Safety Assessment and Management (ISEUSAM - 2012), 2012
2014 9th International Conference on Industrial and Information Systems (ICIIS), 2014
... HERTWIG, President, CSX Intermodal, Jacksonville, FL GLORIA JEAN JEFF, Director, Michigan DOT... more ... HERTWIG, President, CSX Intermodal, Jacksonville, FL GLORIA JEAN JEFF, Director, Michigan DOT ADIB K. KANAFANI, Cahill Professor of ... Tampa, FL CARMINE PALOMBO, Southeast Michigan Council of Governments JILL L. HOCHMAN, FHWA Liaison LORRIE LAU, FHWA ...
Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board, 2015
Driving in fog is a challenging task. ITS application through Changeable Message Sign (CMS) is on... more Driving in fog is a challenging task. ITS application through Changeable Message Sign (CMS) is one of the popular ways to assist drivers in fog. However, an evaluation done on California's Automated Warning System (CAWS) showed that "a generic advisory speed" for a traffic stream is not effective in modifying driver's behavior for better safety. On the other hand existing literature shows that "in-vehicle headway feedback" may be effective in modifying driver behavior. However, to provide such feedback, it is essential to build understanding about safe headways in various visibility conditions. Estimate of such safe headways may be obtained by analyzing drivers' car-following behavior in reduced visibility. In this study real life data on fog driving, containing records such as time of arrival and departure, speed, headway and vehicle lengths are used to study driver's headway maintenance with speed. Investigation is done to check headway variatio...
Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2013
Case Studies on Transport Policy, 2014
ABSTRACT With increasing concern about global warming, greenhouse gas emissions and rising fuel p... more ABSTRACT With increasing concern about global warming, greenhouse gas emissions and rising fuel prices, non-motorized modes, such as bicycle are gaining importance as viable mode in urban transportation worldwide. In small sized Indian cities non-motorized transportation accounts for over two thirds of all trips, but with increase in purchasing power and affordability, Indian commuters are leaning towards motorized private modes leading to a rapid growth in motorized vehicle population and thus increasingly congested roadways and urban air pollution. At this juncture it is very important to investigate that what influences people's mode choice in general and bicycle mode choice in particular. This study has identified specific attitudinal attributes related to Physical factors, Psychological factors, Travel Time sensitivity, Economic aspects, Congestion, Parking, Route or Link level facilities, Route topography, Safety related factors, Security related factor, Environmental awareness and Weather related factors. A travel behavior survey with questionnaire designed to address these attributes was conducted to understand user's attitude toward bicycling in a small Indian city. The survey outcomes were then used in Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA), which revealed Perceived Benefits, Physical Barriers, Safety Hazard, Social Barriers, and Road Condition to be the major factor classes influencing bicycle mode choice. In order to compare user perception with expert perception, a pair wise comparison using Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) has also been performed on factors related to user- specific, route related and journey-related components. The results reveal physical factors, safety related concerns and route topography to be the key and common set of parameters influencing bicycle choice both from the user's and as well as expert's point of view
Journal of Transportation Safety & Security, 2014
ABSTRACT In the absence of geometric design and traffic data, hot-spot identification (HSID) is d... more ABSTRACT In the absence of geometric design and traffic data, hot-spot identification (HSID) is done primarily with crash data only, based on techniques such as crash frequency (CF), fatal crash frequency (FCF), or equivalent property damage only (EPDO), despite the known limitations of these techniques. In this article, the authors propose an improved HSID technique that may be used with crash data only. Using disaggregate crash history information, this method estimates probabilities of crash severities by the major contributing factors using severity models. These probabilities are used to compute expected numbers of severe and fatal crashes at various locations which are then used to classify the locations into two fuzzy cluster, namely hotspot and non-hotspot using Fuzzy C-Means (FCM) algorithm. The identified hotspots are ranked based on their mean departure from the core of the hotspot cluster. These rankings are compared with rankings done using existing techniques namely CF, FCF, EPDO, and Empirical Bayes’ (EB). The proposed method is found to be a robust method for hotspot detection with performance better than existing methods that use crash data only and comparable to the EB method.
Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2013
Accident Analysis & Prevention, 2012
Many local jurisdictions seek to preserve adequate infrastructure by enacting level of service (L... more Many local jurisdictions seek to preserve adequate infrastructure by enacting level of service (LOS) policies for proposed new development. Understanding the relationship between roadway LOS policies and greenhouse gas emissions is an important step towards reducing the emissions related to global climate change. By influencing the evolution of urban infrastructure, these LOS standards can have a significant impact on the type and character of vehicle trips made and the subsequent emissions released. Currently, most jurisdictions establish LOS threshold policies based solely on operational standards and rarely consider the impacts of greenhouse gas emissions.Using a travel demand forecasting model for Grover Beach, CA, buildout conditions were simulated to make the network have operational deficiencies in critical areas, ultimately operating at a LOS F. Changes to roadway lane configurations were then made to achieve LOS thresholds of LOS E through LOS A. The resulting speed and flo...
City and Regional …, 2009