Systems Approach to Develop High Mobility Road Network Plan for Sri Lanka

Abstract

Transportation between major commercial and socio economic hubs will play a vital role in the economy. Since existing road networks have developed based on historical and natural reasons and expressways also have come up with individual proposals with very little consideration on overall connectivity, a need for a systematic approach for future network development has become a necessity. This study focuses on developing a high mobility road network taking into account the possibility of upgrading existing roads as well. Since Administrative Districts and their capitals have already established and developed, 25 District Capitals were selected as the primary centers to be connected and considered as main nodes in the high mobility road network. In addition, all expressway interchanges, other major A-Class road intersections and cities with major traffic attractions were considered as nodes when defining the initial road network. During the analysis stage, development of minimum distance paths and minimum spanning tree were considered to identify bottlenecks, critical nodes and critical links. To identify the optimum network, two criteria, minimizing overall link length, maximizing network speed and achieving desired average speed levels, were considered. A methodology was developed to identify the links to be added or improved such that overall mobility level of the country is improved.

Maritime Network Analysis Based on Geographic Information System for Water Supply Using Shipboard Seawater Desalination System

“…Network analysis has various analytical tools, such as Route, which finds the most appropriate route in a network; Closest Facilities, which can find a location or facility closest to the optimal route in a network; and Service Area, which identifies a service area that can be reached within a certain time around the current location [26,27,32,33]. In this study, the Route tool was used to determine the movement distance according to the optimal route of the ship that sails between islands and the time required for the movement.…”