Optimal Multimodal Travelway Design for an Urban Street Network

Yan Huang,Zongzhi Li

doi:10.1109/access.2020.3030234

Yan Huang, Zongzhi Li

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1109/access.2020.3030234

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Abstract

This study introduces a bi-level model for optimal travelway design of an urban street network by successively executing a lower-level model for traffic assignments and an upper-level model for network travel time minimization. A computational experiment is conducted for optimal travelway design of a 4-square-km urban street network containing 25 signalized intersections, 80 street segments, and 5 bus routes that accommodates 62,640, 43,200, and 33,120 person-trips per hour in AM/PM peak, adjacent-to-peak, and off-peak periods, respectively. Model execution results indicate that adopting a higher number of narrow lanes for auto use only and auto/bus shared use could potentially lead to increases in auto mode share and savings of network total travel time. More narrow lanes for auto use could raise auto speeds, but the auto/bus shared use of narrow travel lanes could slightly fluctuate bus speeds. Further converting narrow lanes for shared use by autos and buses to exclusive bus lanes (EBLs) could enlarge bus mode share, reduce network total travel time, slightly elevate auto speeds, and drastically increase bus speeds. The proposed model could be augmented to incorporate optimization of networkwide intersection signal timing plans, bus signal priorities, and bus dispatching frequencies into optimal travelway design.

Highlights

The population growth and economic development have resulted in increases in travel demand especially in urban areas worldwide
The outcomes of the lower-level model associated with alternative travelway configurations are used as inputs for the upper-level model to compute network total travel times and identify the travelway configuration leading to minimized network total travel time, which would subsequently be used as inputs for executing the lower-level model
Optimal travelway designs are separately developed for AM/PM peak, adjacent-to-peak, and off-peak peak periods with different demand intensities

Summary

Introduction

The population growth and economic development have resulted in increases in travel demand especially in urban areas worldwide. With the pace of travel demand escalation significantly surpassing the level of transportation system capacity expansion, urban street networks in many countries are currently operated near or at capacities especially in daily AM/PM peak periods. Owning to land scarcity in urban areas and prohibitively high costs of road work, capacity expansion measures for congestion mitigation become technically and economically infeasible. Researchers have developed alternative solutions in the context of travel demand management, multimodal integration, and efficient capacity utilization to slow down the deteriorating trend of urban traffic conditions [1]–[5]. For integration of multimodal travel, emphases have been given to integrated scheduling, seamless transfers, vehicle bridging, demand-responsive riding, and streamlined fare, payment, The associate editor coordinating the review of this manuscript and approving it for publication was Nabil Benamar

Methods

Results

Conclusion