An Integrated Microsimulation Approach for Safety Performance Assessment of the Wyoming Connected Vehicle Pilot Deployment Program

Abstract

The 402-mile of Interstate 80 in Wyoming was selected by the U.S. Department of Transportation to develop, test, and deploy a suite of Connected Vehicle (CV) applications (WYDOT CV Pilot). It is expected that after full deployment of CV technology, the pilot will improve safety and mobility under adverse weather conditions by creating new ways to communicate road and travel information to both drivers and fleet managers. In this regard, this research employed an integrated microsimulation modeling approach to assess the safety performance of the WYDOT CV Pilot. A 23-mile representative I-80 corridor was selected for developing the microsimulation models. Traffic flow and driving behavior data under winter snowy weather condition were collected to calibrate the baseline microsimulation model. A driving simulator experiment was conducted to quantitatively investigate the impacts of CV technology on driving behavior; accordingly, the driving behavior data under CV environment were employed to properly update the calibrated CV microsimulation models. The safety effectiveness of the WYDOT CV Pilot were assessed for various demand levels and CV penetration rates. It was concluded that WYDOT CV applications increased drivers’ situation awareness under adverse weather conditions, and thus reduced the crash risk. The reductions in conflicts displayed a decreasing trend with the increase of CV penetration rates, but the reduction was not significant when CV penetration was lower than 10 percent. The maximum reduction in conflicts was 85 percent when all trucks were equipped with CV technology.