Upon an issue of correlation between the running speed of vehicles and traffic capacity of a road section

Abstract

The paper focuses on current algorithms for calculating the traffic capacity of the road sections, provided in various national standards. These algorithms were jointly considering some common groups of factors, such as factors related to the dynamic performance of vehicles and factors related to geometrical - dimensional configuration of the road. The algorithms have particular forms for continuous traffic flow and for discontinuous traffic. As a first stage, there were considered the algorithms for the continuous flows, for which were studied the points of extreme variance for traffic capacity, depending on the running speed. Maximum traffic capacity analytical form for a road section, in continuous traffic flow variant does not depend explicitly of average speed, but allows the evaluation of certain important factors (length section, acceleration at start-up, braking deceleration of vehicles, driver's perception-reaction time, brake friction coefficient, etc.). Consequently, various ways are identified to improve road traffic capacity. The paper justifies reconsideration of the notion of traffic fluence as defined by various national standards; as it stands, the definition of fluency is artificial in relation to the maximum legal speed on that road section, even though the value of that speed is physically impossible.