Effect of speed limits at speed transition zones

Abstract

Speed limits are a common traffic regulation for balancing traffic mobility and safety on roadways. Speed transition zones bear complicated driver behaviours. However, driver behaviours are even more complex when speed transition zones are dynamically created and shifted by variable speed limits (VSLs). Much existing research has estimated long-term driver compliance, evaluated effectiveness of speed enforcement, and attempted to involve compliance into VSL control algorithms. Whereas, limited research provides convincing solutions for representing speed limit effect and estimating real-time driver compliance at speed transition zones. To fill this research gap, this paper analyses field data from two speed transition zones along southbound of 97th Street, Edmonton, Canada. Temporal and spatial variations of speed and driver compliance are investigated in detail using statistical tests. A linear regression is then established to rank the contributions of the selected factors. Finally, some suggestions and guidelines for VSL algorithm design and implementation are proposed.

Synergy Effect of Factors Characterising Village Transition Zones on Speed Reduction

“…Other results were worked out based on in situ speed surveys conducted under natural conditions [26,27,29,33]. Nevertheless, in a majority of cases described in various studies the research data were obtained from traffic simulator tests [20,34,[42][43][44][45][46][47] formulated conclusions from an analysis performed on the basis of driver survey data.…”