Assessing the impacts of heavy vehicles on traffic characteristics of highways under mixed traffic platooning conditions (original) (raw)
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International Journal of Intelligent Transportation Systems Research, Springer, 2021
Heavy-Duty Vehicles (HDVs) on highways are among the major passengers and freight traffic carriers that occupy any space available on the roadway. The movement of HDVs under the mixed traffic environment causes higher levels of interaction between vehicles due to their physical and operational characteristics. Besides, the HDVs operating at less than their desired speed on the highway lanes cause a mixed traffic platoon formation. The primary purpose of the study is to investigate the impact of multi-class HDVs on the speed and flow rates of each highway lane under platooning conditions. In this study, traffic data was collected using an Infra-Red (IR) sensor-based device at six highway sections in India. The simultaneous equations approach is used to model the traffic speeds for determining the Dynamic Passenger Car Unit (DPCU). The speedflow plots are established for Median Lane (ML) and Kerb Lane (KL), a minute before the arrival of HDVs (state A) and a minute after the arrival of HDVs (state B) at the IR sensor detection point, to quantify the impacts of HDVs on the speed and traffic flow rate. The study findings reveal that the speed and flow in ML and KL reduce significantly due to the influence of multi-class HDVs in the general traffic mix. Also, the speed and flow rate in ML and KL decreased with an increase in the percentage of multi-class HDVs. However, this effect was found to be comparatively higher in the ML than that in the KL. Finally, this study sets out recommendations to mitigate the adverse impacts of multi-class HDVs on the highways to enhance the speed and flow rate.
Periodica Polytechnica Transportation Engineering, 2022
The existence of different types of Commercial Vehicles (CVs) in the shared roadway affects traffic flow characteristics differently from other vehicles. Owing to the uncertain placement and movement of these CVs in both longitudinal and lateral directions, the opportunities for lane changing and overtaking by other vehicles with lower maneuverability decrease, resulting in the formation of platoons. The study's primary aim is to assess the effect of mixed traffic platoons formed by three different classes of CVs on highway traffic speed, flow, and density under two different traffic regimes (regimes A and B). In this study, regime A represents the non-platooning condition, and regime B represents the platooning condition. Bi-directional traffic data was collected from the highway sections in India using an Infra-Red sensor-based device. The critical leading time headway is determined for the different CVs (platoon leaders) based on the mean absolute relative speed of platoons. The speed-flow-density plots are established using the macroscopic fundamental diagrams for the highway sections under regimes A and B to quantify the platooning impacts of CVs on the traffic characteristics. The study findings reveal that the speed at capacity, density at capacity, and traffic capacity decreased significantly due to CVs' influence on the general traffic mix during the mixed traffic platooning conditions. However, this effect was found to be relatively higher during the Heavy Commercial Vehicle operation as a platoon leader compared to Medium Commercial Vehicle and Light Commercial Vehicle as a platoon leader.
Survey on Influence of Heavy Vehicle on Traffic Flow at Urban Roads
This research paper describes the impact of heavy vehicles on traffic flow at urban road. A number of factors that are thought of as determinants of this effect were considered in this investigation. The data are collected from the selected patch of 60 m from Hingna T-point to CRPF gate, Nagpur. Data collection is done with the help of video filming technique and data are collected at peak hour and off-peak hour. Some important parameter is considering such as traffic parameter (speed, time, and flow), the capacity of the lane, percentage of heavy vehicles, & congestion for this project. While the study results suggest some similarities between free-flow and congested traffic regimes concerning heavy vehicles. Some important dissimilarities exist due to the different mechanisms that govern heavy vehicles.
IJERT-A Review on Impact of Heavy Vehicles on Highway Traffic
International Journal of Engineering Research and Technology (IJERT), 2021
https://www.ijert.org/a-review-on-impact-of-heavy-vehicles-on-highway-traffic https://www.ijert.org/research/a-review-on-impact-of-heavy-vehicles-on-highway-traffic-IJERTCONV9IS09028.pdf The operational ability and acceleration capability of heavy vehicle are different as that of other smaller size vehicles and passenger car. An increasing number of heavy vehicles in urban traffic may result in relatively different traffic flow characteristics. The purpose of this paper is to examine the study done by Chang-Gyun Roh etal. (2011) [1] , who investigated the effects of Heavy Vehicles on traffic flow using real-time AVC data and to analyse the relationship between average speed, HV ratio, flow rate, and the number of lanes. The work examines the impact of heavy vehicle movement on measured highway traffic characteristics in detail. In order to analyse the impact of heavy vehicles (HV) on highway traffic flow and density, real-time Automatic Vehicle Classification (AVC) data was collected for different major highways (four-lane and six-lane and eight-lane respectively) in Seoul Metropolitan area, South Korea, for a period of 2 months. The observations showed that the average speed decreased with the flow rate increase of flow rate and HV ratio for the highways.
Effect of Mixed Traffic on Capacity of Two-Lane Roads: Case Study on Indian Highways
Procedia Engineering, 2017
This paper focuses on effects of mixed traffic on capacity of two-lane roads. On the basis of field data collected on Indian highways, the present paper makes it clear that capacity reduces if the proportion of slower vehicles increases in the traffic stream. Since such vehicles are responsible for the formation of platoons, their increasing proportion in traffic would accordingly increase the equivalency factor of vehicles, thereby, resulting in variation in capacity. The present study therefore explicates the need of introducing the concept of dynamic passenger car unit and anticipates that this would alleviate the current implication on capacity standards of such roads under mixed traffic.
Effect of traffic composition on capacity of multilane highways
Mixed traffic has always been a major concern in all studies related to estimation of capacity of a highway in developing nations like India. The problem of mixed traffic is generally circumvented by making use of passenger car equivalency factors for different categories of vehicles and converting them into equivalent number of Passenger Cars Units (PCU). However, capacity is also required in terms of vehicles per hour, particularly for quick estimation of volume-to-capacity ratio on a highway. The present study investigates the effect of traffic mix on capacity of four-lane, six-lane divided highways in India. All vehicles on a highway are divided into five categories namely standard car, big car, heavy vehicle, motorized three-wheelers and motorized two-wheelers, and effect of each vehicle type on capacity of the highway is evaluated. The VISSIM software is calibrated and used to generate the traffic operations based on field data using capacity as the measure of performance. Speed-flow curves are developed to find simulated capacity values for different combinations of standard car and one of the remaining four types of vehicles in the traffic stream. The results are finally combined to propose the generalized equations to determine capacity when all or few of the five categories of vehicles are simultaneously present on a highway.
Analysis of traffic characteristics of intercity highway
International Journal of Advance Research, Ideas and Innovations in Technology, 2019
Majority of Indian National Highways and State Highways are two-lane roads. Due to heterogeneous traffic and increase in the number of vehicles every year, the speed, capacity and Percentile speed of these roads is very less. Nowadays these two-lane roads are upgraded into multilane highways. In this project, an attempt is made to study the changes in traffic characteristics of the road after its up gradation. Four traffic characteristics namely Spot Speed, Volume, Percentile Speed and Capacity are studied in this project. Data were collected from National Highway No. 361 which was two-lane road and is now upgraded into a four-lane road. The data on two-lane road and four-lane road was compared and analysed. Spot Speed is used to derive the distribution of traffic stream at a particular location. Flow or volume denotes the number of vehicles travelling on the road with respect to time. 15th, 50th, 85th percentile speed was calculated to study the traffic behaviour on road. Capacity was calculated by using Greenshield's model.
IMPACT OF HEAVY VEHICLES ON THE AVERAGE SPEED AND AVERAGE TRAVEL TIME OF LIGHT VEHICLES
Heavy vehicles have physical and psychological effects on the traffic flow in their vicinity. The presence of heavy vehicle in traffic flow results in speed drops and increased travel times. A pragmatic approach has been followed in this study to measure the impact of heavy vehicles on the speed drops and travel time of vehicles. Three different traffic conditions were considered, result show that the heavy vehicles affects the average speeds and travel times of light vehicles. INTRODUCTION Urban traffic congestion is one of the major problems of the traffic flow studies. In developing countries in general and particularly in Pakistan traffic congestion is increased due to the increase in population and rapid urbanization. Traffic congestion on urban roads is mainly because of the lack of planning and management of vehicles and road infrastructure. The presence of heavy vehicles (trucks of all types) on a road has greater effects than the small vehicles (cars, SUV's etc.) on the average speed and average travel time. The driving behavior of the heavy vehicles and the passenger cars are entirely different from one another [1,2,3]. The proportion of heavy vehicle in any traffic is comparatively less but the impact of the heavy vehicles on traffic flow is greater which contributes in urban traffic congestion [4]. Congestion due to heavy vehicles is the result of their physical characteristics (the dimensions of the heavy vehicle), heavy vehicles have physical and psychological effects on the surroundings, these impacts are studied in [5-8], and these effects on operational characteristics becomes more prominent under heavy traffic conditions. Despite all the effects on operational characteristics on traffic of heavy vehicles, it has received less attention. Previous studies shows that the drivers of the light vehicles avoid to be in the vicinity of the heavy vehicles, therefore they try to provide larger gaps between them or try to change their lane and accelerate, which results in drivers aggression [6, 9]. The frequent lane changing behavior of light vehicles potentially increases the risk of traffic accidents and reduces traffic safety. In this study, a detailed examination of operational characteristics such as speed and travel time of the road is presented. The effect of heavy vehicles on the travel time and speed of light vehicles is calculated on National highway N-45 at Mardan, KPK, Pakistan. Section 2, presents the methodology of the study. The results of the study are provided Section 3, the conclusions are given in Section 4.
Assessment of Operational Quality of Traffic Flow on Indian Highways
In the present study, quantification of level of service for four-lane divided highway has been performed by using simulation technique. For the purpose, three operational service measures are proposed in the study namely traffic stream speed and platoon parameters like average platoon size and percentage following. The criteria or range for each measure to define particular LOS has been compared with criteria in Highway capacity manual (HCM) and reviewed literature. The significant difference in criteriawasobserved due to frequent lane change and undefined lateral behavior of the traffic on multilane highways. Sucha realistic Indian traffic scenario on multilane highway has been modeled and studied through micro-simulation tool 'PASSIM' developed by the authors. The study has been carried on particular section of uninterrupted flow facility which is designated here as 'Rurban' highway hasdistinctly identified between rural highway and urban roads in terms of prevailing traffic condition and driver behavior. The result presented in the form of proposed LOS stratification table based on both quantitative and qualitative operational service measures which practically and indirectly represent road user perceptions too.