Safety Evaluation of Hybrid Main-Line Toll Plazas

Abuzwidah, Muamer; Abdel-Aty, Mohamed; Ahmed, Mohamed M.

doi:10.3141/2435-07

Cited by 13 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 10 publications

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“…In the United States, there are currently many tolled road facilities; these facilities vary in type, size, ownership, and tolling systems deployed (Abuzwidah et al, 2014). Some of these facilities are private along with those owned and operated by various public agencies around the States (Abuzwidah, 2011) (Yang et al, 2014).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Modelling of traffic safety of traditional mainline toll plazas

Abuzwidah

Abdel-Aty

2017

MATEC Web Conf.

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Abstract. Freeways and expressways are considered an important part of any successful transportation system. These facilities carry the majority of daily trips on the transportation network. Although expressways (Toll Roads) offer high level of service, and are considered the safest among other types of roads, traditional toll plazas may have both safety and operational challenges. The traditional toll facilities still experience many crashes, many of which are severe. Therefore, the main focus of this paper is to evaluate the effect of tollbooths' number and types (i.e. cashier lanes, coin lanes and Electronic Toll Collections (ETC) lanes) on safety performance at traditional toll plazas. The literature showed that about 30 to 40 percent of the total crashes on expressways occur at these facilities. An extensive data collection was conducted that included 42 traditional mainline toll plazas located on approximately 750 miles of expressways in Florida, and multiple analytical techniques were used. Based on the finding in this paper, choosing locations for the toll plazas that have safe distances from the interchanges, installing flashing lights at night time, and finding ways to improve signage and road marking are potential means of reducing lane changes before tollbooths. More research is needed and researchers may build on the results of this study.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Even though toll roads offer high mobility benefits, traditional toll facilities may pose high traffic safety risk (Abuzwidah et al, 2014). The literature also showed that different toll collection systems have been adopted by different toll agencies around the world (Mohamed et al, 2000) (Schaufler, 1997).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Modelling of traffic safety of traditional mainline toll plazas

Abuzwidah

Abdel-Aty

2017

MATEC Web Conf.

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“…The sudden increase in the number of crashes that has occurred in toll plazas that operate multiple toll lane configurations has generated the need to study driving behavior (6,7). One of the research tools that can be used for toll plaza safety and human factors studies is driving simulators.…”

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confidence: 99%

Comparative Analysis of Toll Plaza Safety Features in Puerto Rico and Massachusetts with a Driving Simulator

Valdés

Colucci

Knodler

et al. 2017

Transportation Research Record

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Driving simulators have been widely used in transportation research and have potential applications for toll plaza safety research. The University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez (UPRM) and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst (UMass-Amherst) performed a collaborative investigation using driving simulators to evaluate drivers’ behavior in two toll plazas with different signage and lane configurations that operate under the U.S. jurisdiction. The studied toll roads were the Caguas South Toll Plaza in Puerto Rico and the West Springfield Toll Plaza in Massachusetts. The major safety issues identified in both toll roads were unexpected lane changes, sudden vehicle stops, and variable speed patterns. The purpose of this study was to exchange research scenarios between UPRM and UMass-Amherst to test drivers who were unfamiliar with the areas of the study and enlarge the scope. Assuming that the patterns of behavior were similar, the results would suggest that drivers’ behaviors from different regions depend largely on the geometry of the toll plaza and not on the driving culture particular to a region. This study will greatly add to the utility of driving simulator studies because the results reported from one region and one toll plaza arrangement should generalize to other regions around the country and to territories. Results show that familiar drivers had a better driving performance, with respect to variability of lane position, when compared with unfamiliar drivers. However, the proposed treatments for each toll plaza improved road safety for both familiar and unfamiliar drivers.

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“…If no actions are taken to address fatal crashes, road traffic fatalities have been predicted to rise to more than 1.9 million deaths per year by 2020 (9). Driver confusion at toll plazas, difficult merging scenarios, and the resulting unexpected driver behaviors have caused an increment in certain crash patterns and other safety problems at toll plazas with electronic tolling facilities (10)(11)(12).…”

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confidence: 99%

Driving Simulation of the Safety and Operation Performance at a Freeway Toll Plaza

Valdés

Colucci

Fisher

et al. 2016

Transportation Research Record

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Toll plaza designs have implemented electronic toll collection and other technologies to improve toll systems; however, an increase in crashes has appeared with these improvements. To study safely the pertinent aspects of driver behavior in toll plazas with electronic toll collection, a cockpit driving simulator housed at the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez was used. Specifically, in this study a comparison was made of two configurations of the signs that indicated the corresponding speed limit and toll station for each lane in the area before the toll plaza. One configuration corresponded to the current condition of the signage in Puerto Rico, with signs located at the roadside; the second configuration presented a proposed overhead signage treatment. A representative group of 20 subjects was selected to test the effectiveness of the two signage configurations on the approach zone leading to the toll plaza, calculating the standard deviation of roadway position, speed, and acceleration noise in five zones. The behavior of drivers using the proposed signage configuration appeared to be safer than the behavior of drivers following the current signage configuration. Specifically, at each of five zones in which behavior was sampled on the approach to the toll plaza, drivers using the proposed configuration changed lanes more smoothly and reduced their vehicles’ velocity more when approaching the toll plaza. Nevertheless, there was no significant difference between configurations in acceleration noise. The results of this study provide strong evidence that driving simulators can be used effectively to identify efficient and inexpensive alternative signage configurations at toll plazas.

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Safety Evaluation of Hybrid Main-Line Toll Plazas

Cited by 13 publications

References 10 publications

Modelling of traffic safety of traditional mainline toll plazas

Modelling of traffic safety of traditional mainline toll plazas

Comparative Analysis of Toll Plaza Safety Features in Puerto Rico and Massachusetts with a Driving Simulator

Driving Simulation of the Safety and Operation Performance at a Freeway Toll Plaza

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