Volume 7, 2009

Vol. 7, No. 1, June 2009
Special Issue on Sustainable Transportation Systems

Research papers

Number: 2009-09-S
Type: Research Paper
Pages: 3-13
Title: Investigation into Travel Modes of TOD Users: Impacts of Personal and Transit Characteristics
Author(s): Deepti Sadashiv Muley (Queensland University of Technology)
Jonathan Bunker (Queensland University of Technology)
Luis Ferreira (Queensland University of Technology)

Received: 30/01/2009
Revised:
Accepted: 07/04/2009

Abstract: Transit Oriented Developments (TODs) are often designed to promote the use of sustainable modes of transport and reduce car usage. This paper investigates the effect of personal and transit characteristics on travel choices of TOD users. Binary logistic regression models were developed to determine the probability of choosing sustainable modes of transport including walking, cycling and public transport. Kelvin Grove Urban Village (KGUV) located in Brisbane, Australia was chosen as case study TOD. The modal splits for employees, students, shoppers and residents showed that 47% of employees, 84% of students, 71% of shoppers and 56% of residents used sustainable modes of transport.

Keywords: TOD, sustainable mode choice, logistic regression, mode share

Number: 2009-10-S
Type: Research Paper
Pages: 15-26
Title: Evaluation of Advanced Transport Systems for Sustainable Urban Mobility
Author(s): Adriano Alessandrini (University of Rome La Sapienza)
Michel Parent (INRIA-Institut National de Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique)
Yoram Zvirin (Technion – Israel Institute of Technology)

Received: 03/02/2009
Revised: 02/05/2009
Accepted: 15/05/2009

Abstract: A general evaluation methodology is presented for Advanced Transportation Systems, which can be applied for other ITS applications. It includes three phases: initial, ex-ante and ex-post, and is based on measurements of several sets of indicators. Results are presented for sites studied in the EU CityMobil and for energy management and optimization. Cross comparisons enable recommendations for adoption and implementation of sustainable urban CTS. System optimization can be achieved, leading to reduced energy consumption and emission of pollutants and greenhouse gases. It is noted that the first ever large scale PRT is under construction now at the Heathrow Airport.

Keywords: Advanced Transportation Systems, Evaluation, PRT, Cybercars

Number: 2009-12-S
Type: Research Paper
Pages: 27-37
Title: Cross-Layer Coordination for Safety Applications Enabled by Wireless Access in Vehicular Environments
Author(s): Jeremy J. Blum (Penn State University)
Azim Eskandarian (The George Washington University)
Received: 06/02/2009
Revised: 15/04/2009
Accepted: 16/04/2009
Abstract: A wide range of future vehicle safety applications will rely on the wireless transmission of vehicle heartbeat messages, containing the location and kinematics of each vehicle. This paper demonstrates the impact of application level scheduling on the delivery rate of the high-volume, periodic messages. A cross-layer coordination protocol is proposed in which the heartbeat application protocol leverages knowledge about the configuration and current state of the physical and media access (MAC) layers in order to boost the message delivery rate by decreasing the number of transmission collisions. An integrated simulation system which combines a widely used microscopic vehicle simulator with a communications network simulator that this cross-layer coordination can produce improvements in the ratio of collisions to messages received of 44% to 88% for single-band radios and 18% to 92% for dual-band radios.
Keywords: Inter-Vehicle Communication, Wireless Access in Vehicular Environments, Vehicle Heartbeat Messages

Number: 2009-13-S
Type: Research Paper
Pages: 39-48
Title: Heterogeneity in Multi-Anticipative Car-Following Behavior by Video Image Data
Author(s): DaHee Hong (Kyoto University)
Nobuhiro Uno (Kyoto University)
Fumitaka Kurauchi (Gifu University)

Received: 10/02/2009
Revised: 08/05/2009
Accepted: 11/05/2009

Abstract: Microscopic road traffic flow simulation models are increasingly being used to express the dynamic nature of traffic flow. These microscopic traffic simulations require vehicle movements to be modeled and calibrated. Since individual vehicles exhibit heterogeneity, the parameters within these sub-models must incorporate some disturbances. However, due to limited observational data, the various parameters among individuals have not been well validated. We collected video data from an 800m section of an urban expressway over 1 week using 11 video cameras. By tracking individual vehicles on-screen, we can obtain vehicle trajectories. We applied this manually obtained data to investigate individual heterogeneity of vehicle movement; in particular, we focused on multi-anticipative car following behavior, heterogeneity among individuals and relationship between car-following behavior and road geometry.

Keywords: Video Image Data, Car-following, Driving heterogeneity

Number: 2009-11-S
Type: Research Paper
Pages: 49-58
Title: Traffic Energy and Emission Reductions at Signalized Intersections: A Study of the Benefits of Advanced Driver Information
Author(s): Meng Li (University of California at Berkeley)
Kanok Boriboonsomsin (University of California at Riverside)
Guoyuan Wu (University of California at Berkeley)
Wei-Bin Zhang (University of California at Berkeley)
Matthew Barth (University of California at Riverside)

Received: 03/02/2009
Revised: 24/04/2009
Accepted: 12/05/2009

Abstract: Emissions from motor vehicles are a major cause of deteriorating urban air quality. Previous studies revealed that unnecessary acceleration and hard braking in response to sudden changes of traffic signals causes a significant amount of wasted energy and elevated emissions. Altering driver behaviors can potentially contribute to the reductions of vehicle energy/emissions. This paper proposes an advanced driving alert system that provides traffic signal status information to help drivers avoid hard braking at intersections. It also defines a method for evaluating vehicle energy consumption and emissions at intersections, and investigates the potential benefits of such system.

Keywords: Arterials, traffic information, wireless communication, energy, emissions

Number: 2009-04-S
Type: Research Paper
Pages: 59-65
Title: CO2 and Noise Evaluation Model linked with Traffic Simulation for a Citywide Area
Author(s): Keisuke Tsukui (Japan Automobile Research Institute)
Hisatomo Hanabusa (i-Transport Lab. Co., Ltd.)
Hiroyuki Oneyama (Tokyo Metropolitan University)
Yasuo Oshino (Japan Automobile Research Institute)
Masao Kuwahara (Institute of Industrial Science, University of Tokyo)

Received: 21/01/2009
Revised: 01/06/2009
Accepted: 02/06/2009

Abstract: This study develops a system which combines CO2 emission and road noise models with a traffic simulation model to evaluate the environmental impacts by several traffic management schemes for a citywide area. Historically, CO2 emission, road noise, and traffic simulation models have been intensively studied by quite a few researchers. However, they have been developed almost independently and a few considered a joint use of the models so that CO2 emission and/or road noise could be evaluated from the simulated traffic condition. We therefore propose a system in which the above three models are linked together. The system is validated by applying to a whole Tsukuba city and outputs from the proposed system gets reasonable agreement with the observed traffic flow, travel times, and noise levels.

Keywords: Road Noise, CO2 Emission, Traffic Simulation

Number: 2009-06-S
Type: Research Paper
Pages: 67-75
Title: Modeling of Road Pricing considering Local Emissions of Road Transportation Network
Author(s): Yasuo Asakura (Kobe University)
Nataraju Jakkula (Kobe University)

Received: 29/01/2009
Revised: 22/04/2009, 04/06/2009
Accepted: 04/06/2009

Abstract: Road pricing from an economic point of view has largely been motivated by the time costs that eachツ road user imposes on other road users. For many years road pricing has been attracting considerable attention of analysts and policymakersツ as a means of relieving urban traffic congestion and recently for local traffic air-pollution problems. In this paper, an optimum model is proposed considering local traffic emissions and illustrated with hypothetical network. Davidson time-flow function and vehicle speed-emission factor relationship is considered. Augmented lagrangean algorithm is proposed for solution and is validated by comparing the pricings with that of descriptive approach using UE model. It is found that the model estimates quite accurate solution.

Keywords: Optimum tolls, Road pricing, local emissions, External costs, Environmental externalities

Vol. 7, No. 2, October 2009

Research Paper

Number: 2007-12
Type: Research Paper
Pages: 77-88
Title: Estimating Traffic Flow by Image Processing and the Usage of an Adaptive Traffic Signal Control System
Author(s): Sheng-Fuu Lin (National Chiao Tung University)
Shih-Che Chien (National Chiao Tung University)
Kuo-Yu Chiu (National Chiao Tung University)

Received: 06/11/2007
Revised: 24/07/2008, 20/01/2009
Accepted: 20/01/2009

Abstract: The Robust and reliable traffic information detection from images acquired by traffic surveillance system is an important problem with numerous applications including adaptive traffic signal control system and traffic analysis system. This paper describes an application of computer vision techniques to traffic surveillance. The objective in this paper is to improve the efficiency of traffic flow estimation that include pedestrian flow and vehicular flow estimation. Specifically, some vision based methodologies that including perspective transformation, object segmentation and classification have been employed to traffic flow estimation. Traffic congestion in urban area is still an important issue to be solved. One of the reasons of congestion in urban area is imperfect operation of traffic signal control. A traffic signal control problem can be formulated as a decision making problem for a stochastic dynamic system. To minimize the queue length and vehicle delay time, an adaptive traffic signal control system that used signification traffic information to find the optimal phase sequencing of traffic signal has been proposed in this paper. The experiment results of intersection traffic simulation indicate that our approach has better performance than other two control systems.

Keywords: Traffic flow, vehicular flow, pedestrian, adaptive traffic signal control, fuzzy inference system

Number: 2008-10
Type: Research Paper
Pages: 89-94
Title: Travel Time Prediction on Inter-Urban Expressways Based on Uplink Information from Vehicles to DSRC beacons
Author(s): Yoshiyasu Murashige (Expressway Research Institute, Inc.)
Takahiro Shitama (Expressway Research Institute, Inc.)
Ryota Horiguchi (i-Transport Lab. Co., Ltd.)

Received: 06/04/2008
Revised: 24/09/2008, 30/03/2009
Accepted: 08/04/2009

Abstract: This paper describes a method of travel time prediction for inter-urban expressways using uplink information from equipped vehicles with on-board ETC unit. Uplink information, which contains vehicleツ’s ID and data transmission time, is collected at a beacon installed on roadside and matched with another uplink information at the adjacent beacon to measure the travel time of the vehicle (uplink travel time). Uplink travel time would be more fundamental than the conventional travel time information estimated by loop detector speed, but it will be inaccurate when a queue is foun
on the expressway because of the measurement delay. Therefore, it must be followed by an appropriate prediction method to compensate the measurement delay. In this paper, the way of uplink travel time measurement is outlined at first. Then, the prediction method based on cumulative traffic flow diagram is explained. Finally, the proposed method is applied for the travel time prediction on the Kyushu Expressway and validated its advantage by comparing with conventional travel time information.

Keywords: travel time prediction, expressway, telematics, uplink, ETC, DSRC

Number: 2009-03-S
Type: Research Paper
Pages: 95-99
Title: Progress of an ITS Field Operational Test for Traffic Safety and Congestion in Japan
Author: Masao Fukushima (NISSAN MOTOR CO., LTD.)

Received: 16/01/2009
Revised: 25/05/2009, 27/05/2009
Accepted: 27/05/2009

Abstract: In order to reduce traffic accidents and ease traffic congestion utilizing ITS (Intelligent Transportation System), a largescale FOT (Field Operational Test) involving 2,000 ordinary drivers was launched in October 2006 in the city of Yokohama in Kanagawa, Japan. The test is slated to continue through March 2009. Target applications include Intersection Collision Avoidance using V-I (Vehicle-to-Infrastructure) communication, ISA (Intelligent Speed Advisory) using digital maps in the vehicle navigation system, and the probe system, which provides detailed traffic information. As new trials, Pedestrian Traffic Safety and Skid Incident Information Service have also started. In this paper, the progress of these FOTs will be introduced.

Keywords: V2I, C2I, FOT, Safety, Intersection, Pedestrian, Congestion, Probe

Number: 2008-05
Type: Research Paper
Pages: 101-108
Title: Implementation of Short-Term Travel Time Prediction Model on Urban Expressway
Author(s): Chong Wei (Kobe University)
Takamasa Iryo (Kobe University)
Yasuo Asakura (Kobe University)

Received: 21/03/2008
Revised: 15/07/2008, 11/12/2008, 27/04/2009
Accepted: 14/06/2009

Abstract: Prediction of travel times is a vital function of many advanced traveler information systems. In this study, an experimental analysis of the relationship between instantaneous travel time and real travel time is carried out and a method to predict freeway travel times using a linear model is proposed. The proposed method is applied to a data set of the Hanshin Expressway. The implementation process of the travel time prediction model is described in detail in this article.

Keywords: travel time prediction, implementation, linear model