Traffic Safety Evaluation of Nighttime and Daytime Work Zones

Construction sites or work zones create serious disruptions in the normal flow of traffic, resulting in major inconveniences for the traveling public. Furthermore, these work zones create safety hazards that require special consideration. Current legislation and programs, at both state and national levels, emphasize the need for a better understanding of work zone problems to address work zone safety. This reality—coupled with the temporary closure of more miles of highway every year for rehabilitation and maintenance—makes the analysis of safety at construction sites a serious matter. A summary of a comprehensive study associated with the development of a new practical approach to address highway safety in construction zones is presented. Because empirical models require sample sizes that are not attainable due to the intrinsic scarcity of construction zone accident data, the problem was studied from the point of view of risk analysis. Monte Carlo simulations were used to develop risk factors. These factors are meant to be included in the calculations of additional user costs for work zones, or simply applied as risk measurements, to optimize the length and duration of closures for highway reconstruction and rehabilitation projects. In this way, it will be possible to assess the danger of work zones to the traveling public and minimize adverse effect of work zones on highway safety.

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Research on Traffic Safety Evaluation of Expressway Based on Rough Set and RBF Neural Network

ICTIS 2011 ◽

10.1061/41177(415)166 ◽

2011 ◽

Author(s):

Weifeng Fan ◽

Shunfeng Guo ◽

Yuanbo Yang ◽

Baoyu Shang

Keyword(s):

Neural Network ◽

Rough Set ◽

Traffic Safety ◽

Rbf Neural Network ◽

Safety Evaluation

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Improved Road Safety at Work Zones using Advanced Traveler Information Systems

University of the Future: Re-Imagining Research and Higher Education ◽

10.29117/quarfe.2020.0243 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Mustafa Suhail Almallah ◽

Qinaat Hussain ◽

Wael K. M Alhajyaseen ◽

Tom Brijs

Keyword(s):

Traffic Safety ◽

Driving Simulator ◽

Work Zone ◽

Speed Limit ◽

Work Zones ◽

Treatment Scenario ◽

Lane Changing ◽

Variable Message Signs ◽

Study Results ◽

Message Signs

Work zones are road sections where road construction or maintenance activities take place. These work zones usually have different alignment and furniture than the original road and thus temporary lower speeds are adopted at these locations. However, drivers usually face difficulty in adopting the new speed limit and maneuvering safely due to the change in alignment. Therefore, work zones are commonly considered as hazardous locations with higher crash rates and severities as reported in the literature. This study aims to investigate the effectiveness of a variable message signs (VMSs) based system for work zone advance warning area. The proposed system aims at enhancing driver adaptation of the reduced speed limit, encourage early lane changing maneuvers and improve the cooperative driving behavior in the pre-work zone road section. The study was conducted using a driving simulator at the College of Engineering of Qatar University. Seventy volunteers holding a valid Qatari passenger car driving license participated in this study. In the simulator experiment, we have two scenarios (control and treatment). The control scenario was designed based on the Qatar Work Zone Traffic Management Guide (QWZTMG), where the length of the advance warning area is 1000 m. Meanwhile, the treatment scenario contains six newly designed variable message signs where two of them were animation-based. The VMSs were placed at the same locations of the static signs in the control scenario. Both scenarios were tested for two situations. In the first situation, the participants were asked to drive on the left lane while in the second situation, they were instructed to drive on the second lane. The study results showed that the proposed system was effective in motivating drivers to reduce their traveling speed in advance. Compared to the control scenario, drivers’ mean speed was significantly 6.3 and 11.1 kph lower in the VMS scenario in the first and second situations, respectively. Furthermore, the VMS scenario encouraged early lane changing maneuvers. In the VMS scenario, drivers changed their lanes in advance by 150 m compared to the control scenario. In addition, the proposed system was effective in motivating drivers to keep larger headways with the frontal merging vehicle. Taking into account the results from this study, we recommend the proposed VMS based system as a potentially effective treatment to improve traffic safety at work zones.

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