Impact of Metro Rail Construction Work Zone on Traffic Environment

Abstract

Implementation of metro rail projects paves way to the construction activities and in this process long term construction work zones are inevitable. Long term work zones on urban roads lead to many problems such as reduction in capacity, increase the travel time delays, queue length, fuel consumption, number of forced merges, and roadway accidents which lead to unaccounted economic losses. So it becomes necessary to study and quantify the impact of mass rapid transit system construction work zones on traffic environment which will further help in estimating the economic loss due to metro rail construction work zone. This research aimed to study the impact of metro rail construction work zones on traffic environment and consequently quantify these impacts for present situation. Using VisSim 6.0 software, effect of intersection in a work zone was studied. Queue lengths were calculated in work zone and non work zone conditions. Total economic losses is calculated to be around 20crore/km/year for elevated metro construction in the given site. With such huge economic loss it becomes imperative to have systematic work zone scheduling and traffic management techniques so as to reduce the impacts of metro rail construction work zones.