Abstract
Traffic calming, as a traffic engineering discipline, is becoming an increasingly important aspect of the road engineering process. One of the traffic calming treatments are pedestrian refuges—raised islands located on or at the road centreline. This paper presents factors relevant to the performance of this kind of traffic calming devices retrofitted on the stretches of regional roads in village areas. To this end, speed surveys were carried out before and after the islands in each direction on purposefully chosen test sections. In order to identify the determinants, each test section was characterised by features including the symmetry of the road layout geometry, surrounding features and the existing traffic signs and, last but not least, visibility of the road ahead. The survey data were used by the authors to perform analyses in order to group the speeds at the pedestrian refuges and relate them to specific factors and, finally, identify the determinants of speed reduction. In this way, the authors arrived at a conclusion that the performance of pedestrian refuges depends on a number of factors rather than solely on their geometric parameters. The analyses showed that the pedestrian refuge geometric parameters, features located in its proximity that influence the driver’s perception and placement of appropriate marking, can, in combination, result in achieving the desired speed reduction and ensure safety of non-motorised users. These hypotheses were tested on a stretch of a regional road in village area at three points of the process: before upgrading, after installation of pedestrian refuges, and after retrofitting of enhancements.
Highlights
Economic growth increases the road traffic and the associated problems are bound to intensify as a result
In order to compare the results obtained in this research with the results obtained by other researchers the authors have redrawn the graph relating the speed reduction to the speed value after researchers the authors have redrawn the graph relating the speed reduction to the speed value after the central island (Figure 11) published in [14] replacing the shape and width of the central island the central island (Figure 11) published in [14] replacing the shape and width of the central island with the width of pedestrian refuge island
The results results of this comparison are regional roads in Poland in the vicinity vicinity of of pedestrian pedestrian refuges
Summary
Economic growth increases the road traffic and the associated problems are bound to intensify as a result. In the case of villages located on primary routes (further called regional roads) this growth of traffic is more conspicuous, as compared to small or bigger towns, due to accumulation of problems on a relatively short stretch of the road. One of the key issues is ensuring safety on the pedestrian crossings in villages. To this end, various traffic calming treatments are installed, positioned both in the entry zones and in the village centre areas. Various traffic calming treatments are installed, positioned both in the entry zones and in the village centre areas The latter include pedestrian refuges whose primary function is to protect vulnerable road users (VRU). According to the guidelines of [1]
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