Review of Studies on Mixed Traffic Flow: Perspective of Developing Economies

Abstract

The traffic scenario in developing economies is fundamentally different from that of the developed economies. The latter is predominantly composed of passenger cars and can be aptly termed as ''homogeneous'' traffic, whereas the former is composed of vehicle types with a wide variety of static and dynamic characteristics, which occupy the same right of way, resulting in an unsynchronized movement of the vehicles. Another distinguishing characteristic of this traffic is the absence of lane-discipline, resulting from the wide variation in sizes and maneuvering abilities of the vehicles. These distinctions result in some phenomena like vehicle creeping, which are absent in the homogeneous traffic. Hence, this type of traffic can be referred to as ''heterogeneous disordered'' or ''mixed'' traffic. A review of the literature has shown that most of the studies in such traffic make use of the methods and concepts developed for homogeneous traffic. Very few studies have attempted to capture and understand the distinctive characteristics of the mixed traffic. The primary objective of this paper is to provide a review of the studies on various mixed traffic characteristics in developing economies, identify their limitations and provide guidelines for the future research. Also, a detailed methodology of the simulation process for the mixed traffic is given, reflecting the ''gap-filling'' rather than the conventional ''car-following'' behavior. A comparison of the past modeling approaches is also presented and the accuracy of their implementation is discussed.

Headway distribution models of two-lane roads under mixed traffic conditions: a case study from India

“…The plot indicates a large proportion of shorter headways at moderate and heavy flow. Speeds of vehicles were also determined based on their category wise average length [27] and the time that they have taken while covering it. The possible capacity of the highway section was observed to be around 2300 pc/h for the prevailing mixed traffic [28] and it was used in computing volume to capacity ratio in subsequence; values that range between 0.6-0.7 and above 0.7 were used to approximate the moderate and heavy flow respectively.…”

Kinerja Lalu Lintas Berdasarkan Okupansi, Komposisi Kendaraan pada Bundaran Tirosa Kota Kupang

“…Bukti empiris menunjukkan bahwa struktur pola lalu lintas membuat kondisi operasional di jalan raya, jalan raya dan persimpangan jauh dari kondisi ideal seperti yang dijelaskan oleh Manual Kapasitas Jalan Raya [5] [6]. Heterogenitas pengemudi, pengguna, dan kendaraan yang berinteraksi satu sama lain dalam lalu lintas berdampak pada tingkat kualitas operasional dan kondisi keselamatan entitas jalan [7] [8]. Interaksi antar kendaraan yang memiliki berbagai ukuran, dan fitur statis dan dinamis juga dapat memengaruhi keakuratan penilaian dan aplikasi manajemen lalu lintas apa pun [9].…”

Understanding sustainability effectiveness on design strategy of ten-lane expressway merging areas based on entropy method

“…When lane separation for trucks and passenger vehicles is implemented in high traffic density conditions, the performance and vehicle types on each lane tend to be consistent, leading to the formation of vehicle platoons with similar speeds and smaller following distances, referred to as homogeneous traffic flow (Kerner and Konhäuser, 1993;Verma, 2016). The short time headways and inhomogeneous traffic flow can make it difficult for other vehicles to merge.…”