Urban Road Transport Research Articles

VALUATING THE IMPACT OF URBAN ROAD TRANSPORTATION ON LAND USE PATTERNS IN GBAGADA LAGOS STATE

This study investigates the relationship between urban road transportation and land use patterns in Gbagada Lagos state. Using a mixed-methods approach combining Geographic Information System (GIS) analysis, survey questionnaires, and regression modeling, this research examines how road network density, traffic volume, and transportation modes influence land use changes. The findings reveal significant correlations between road proximity, land value, and urban sprawl. Specifically, areas with high road density exhibit increased commercial and residential development, while areas with limited accessibility experience decreased land value and reduced development. Policy recommendations include optimizing transportation infrastructure, promoting mixed-use development, and implementing smart growth strategies to mitigate urban sprawl and enhance sustainable land use. In particular, certain transportation planning decisions tend to increase sprawl (dispersed, urban fringe, automobile-dependent development), while others support smart growth (more compact, infill, multimodal development). These development patterns have various economic, social, and environmental impacts. This report describes specific methods for evaluating these impacts in transport planning.

Evaluating low-emission-zone impacts on urban road transport system in large city

The purpose of the study was to assess the impact that a low emission zone (LEZ) would have on the road transport subsystem. Different scenarios were adopted regarding: the spatial extent of the zone itself; the stages of its implementation, and the vehicles on the network (by age, engine displacement, and fuel type). The study was based on a macroscopic traffic model of Łódź employed to analyse how any LEZ-related restrictions may affect the operation of the urban road transport system in the city. The conducted analyses showed that while the implementation of a low emission zone would positively affect the environment, it would have a negative impact on the performance of the urban transport system itself. The simulations for each spatial scenario of the LEZ revealed that it would increase the travel times and distances necessary within the city limits, and also decrease travel speeds.

A Multi-Scale Validation and Analysis of Flash Flooding Impacts on Urban Road Transportation

A Multi-Scale Validation and Analysis of Flash Flooding Impacts on Urban Road Transportation

Urban Road Transport Infrastructure Planning and Development Implications on Socio-Economic Growth in the City of Douala, Cameroon

Cities are the major contributors to socio- economic growth with easy access to amenities which stem through road transport infrastructure development. This study was conducted to assess urban road transport infrastructure planning and examine development implications on socio-economic growth in the City of Douala. A descriptive research design was used with primary and secondary data collected and analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistical techniques. Results revealed that, transport infrastructure in Douala have been structured through urban development planning policy which influences surface spatial expansion of socio- economic activities. The planning policies have contributed to the rapid expansion and growth through the initiations of master plan, land use plan and sector plan. Infrastructural development on road transport depicts a physical expansion and construction of road networks which influences the socio-economic growth of the study area. Stakeholders’ actions on construction, reconstruction and rehabilitation, investments and maintenance of road infrastructure have helped to curb down some transportation challenges and creates easy access to facilities within different sectors of the study area. However, road transport infrastructure which is well-developed boasts socio-economic activities and growth. The state of road transport network, its diversity and characteristic features is defined by its prevalence within different areas in Douala. Contrarily, other transport infrastructures which are not functioning appropriately due to lapses in physical planning possess enormous implications on transportation in the study area. The conclusion drawn was that the manner in which urban planning policies are implemented determines the level of development in road transport infrastructure and socio-economic growth of Douala. The study recommends an effective application of planning policies to be integrated by implicating all the actors of urban managers and transportation planners for improved growth in the study area.

A trajectory optimization method for CAVs at intersections considering energy-efficiency balance

With the development of vehicle-to-everything (V2X) technology, connected automated vehicles (CAVs) will be an important part of urban road transportation. However, frequent acceleration, deceleration, and rapid stopping within intersections lead to increased energy consumption, reduced driving efficiency and balanced benefits. The study proposes an optimal control method for vehicle trajectories that considers energy-efficiency balance (OCM-EEB) based on the characteristics of V2X technology. The method first develops a vehicle trajectory control model based on the Intelligent Driver Model (IDM) by accounting for the features of V2X technology, and further, introduces the idea of balanced optimization, considering energy-efficiency balance, a vehicle trajectory optimal control model (OCM) is proposed. The proposed model was solved by design algorithms based on the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm-II (NSGA-II). The experimental results showed that the vehicle trajectory optimization control method could increase the balanced driving efficiency of the vehicle within intersection, which is conducive to improving the robustness of the vehicle’s trajectory state, and then prove the effectiveness of the method proposed in this study. The method also provides an important technical basis for the vehicle trajectory optimization experiments under a real V2X environment in the future.

ERGONOMIC AND LOGISTIC ENSURING THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE COMFORT DURING THE ORGANIZATION OF PASSENGER TRANSPORTATION IN A SMALL-CAPACITY BUS

Purpose. The most important advantage of passenger transport by road is the high quality of transport service, which depends on the organization of the transport process, structural features and technical condition of the rolling stock used and the route, the development of the route network and other factors. Comfort reflects the properties of bus passenger transportation, which lead to the creation of the necessary service conditions and convenience for passengers in the bus, at the start-end and transit points on the basis of regulatory documents approved in the prescribed manner. Features of the design of small-capacity buses in terms of comfort and safety of passenger transportation and provision of proper travel conditions mostly determine the scope of use of buses of this class by types of connections and length of routes. The purpose of the paper is the development of a structural model, based on the analysis of the main factors affecting the determination of the comfort of a small-capacity bus for urban transportation during the transportation of passengers. Methods. The analysis of literary sources showed that indicators of comfort (as well as indicators of information service, speed, timeliness, safety of cargo, safety), which refer to indicators of the quality of passenger transportation, are decisive in this group of indicators. From the point of view of Ukrainian legislation and regulatory framework, the concepts of passenger bus capacity and comfort are analyzed. The main factors that determine the comfort of small-capacity buses for urban transportation during the transportation of passengers are determined. Ensuring the comfort of passenger transportation in a small-capacity city bus is determined by compliance with ergonomic requirements, which, in turn, depends on the design features of the arrangement of the area intended for passengers. Scientific novelty. It is proposed to evaluate the comfort category in the urban public road transport system using a structural model that combines two sets of factors – logistic and ergonomic. The logistic set of factors includes characteristics in time and space, that is, characteristics of comfort outside the means of urban public road transport. The ergonomic set of factors includes characteristics that describe comfort in vehicles. Practical significance. On the basis of this model, possible ways of ensuring ergonomic requirements for the layout of the interior and interior of small-capacity buses for urban passenger transportation are proposed. It was established that the main factors of the redistribution of transport mobility between urban passenger transport and transport for individual use are the insufficient comfort of passenger transport or the insufficient density of the route network.

Dynamic Approach to Update Utility and Choice by Emerging Technologies to Reduce Risk in Urban Road Transportation Systems

Dynamic Approach to Update Utility and Choice by Emerging Technologies to Reduce Risk in Urban Road Transportation Systems

Changes in the equilibrium of the urban transport system of a large city following an urban flood

Urban floods are among the most frequent and destructive natural disasters. They generate enormous economic and non-economic losses, including damage to buildings and transportation infrastructure, which are critical systems supporting community well-being. The purpose of this paper was to assess the impact an urban flood would have on the urban road transport system in Łódź and to determine changes in potential accessibility that would accompany a flood. This paper introduces a novel approach in terms of combining the modelling of direct impact ranges of urban flooding in the area of Łódź and a macroscopic multi-motivational traffic model for the city (using PTV Visum software). This made it possible to identify mechanisms of changes made in as many intra-system relationships as possible, as well as between the system and its surroundings. The results showed that changes in the spatial distribution of traffic volume in the city are closely dependent on the water level. The sections of the network most affected by the load changes are those that form the framework for the entire system of Łódź, indicating a lack of resilience of the car transport subsystem in the critical segment for the functioning quality of the entire subsystem. Additionally, the study was conducted for public transport, and it was indicated that changes in its utilization are minimal. It was also found that the greatest impact on transport accessibility from an urban flood is for ultra-short trips. This is primarily due to the base effect (the initial quality of the infrastructure and its potential) – the internal potential of the transport area deteriorates drastically during a flood, severely affecting accessibility.

Assessing the impact of urban road transport development on haze pollution in the Yangtze River Delta region

The aim of this paper is to explore whether and how urban road transport (URT) development affects haze pollution. One of the innovations of this paper is that URT development is measured by road accessibility with novel digital elevation model datasets, which have been used by few scholars. The endogenous problem caused by revere causality issue in the relationship between URT development and haze pollution is also considered. Based on the panel data of prefecture-level cities of Yangtze River Delta (YRD) region in China from 2011 to 2018, this paper uses long-lagged values of URT development as the instrumental variable, employing the two-stage least squares (2SLS) method. The study shows that URT development leads to an increase of haze pollution. Moreover, mechanism tests based on moderating and mediating models support the finding that decreasing haze pollution resulted from better connection effects, while rising agglomeration effects tend to bring about increasing haze pollution, and the latter effect is larger in magnitude than the former. Current URT development may have long-term negative consequences for livability of YRD cities, and urban decision makers should reconsider the effectiveness of the current road transport investment and construction.

Justification of key factors regarding the application of prospective ecological transport in the urban passenger transportation system

Research objective. Justification of the key factors that have an impact on the introduction of promising ecological transport in the system of urban passenger transport in order to improve the quality of transport services for passengers and improve ecology in densely populated cities. Materials and methods. To achieve the goal, the fuzzy Dematel method is used, which is based on graph theory and allows to classify all available factors that influence decision-making based on cause-and-effect relationships. Results. The eight key factors that form the transport project and the factors that have a significant impact on them are substantiated for the implementation of the transport project of the implementation of promising ecological passenger transport on urban routes into the transport system of urban passenger transportation. These include the level of development of modern transport technologies when transporting passengers on city routes and the availability of their support centers; the availability of financial programs for updating/restructuring the rolling stock fleet of the motor vehicle enterprise and the availability of the appropriate legal framework for preferential operation of electric passenger transport; rapid adaptation of the transport infrastructure of a modern city for the operation of ecological transport; compliance of ecological transport with the transport characteristics of the passenger transportation route; operational properties of a modern electric bus; the effect of relevant legislative initiatives regarding benefits for the purchase and costs of operating electric vehicles. Scientific novelty consists in identifying the interrelationships between the factors that form the transport project and the factors that have a significant influence on them, on the implementation of the transport project of the implementation of promising ecological passenger transport on urban routes into the transport system of urban passenger transport, which allows to estimate the possible economic costs of road transport enterprises carrying out passenger transportation. Practical significance lies in the determination of key factors that can be used for the implementation of a transport project for the use of promising ecological passenger transport in the system of urban passenger road transport

Ideology of Urban Road Transport Chaos and Accident Risk Management for Sustainable Transport Systems

Transport systems are complex systems present in modern cities. The sustainability of all other urban systems depends on the sustainable functioning of urban transport. Various processes occur within transport systems. Road traffic is one of them. At the same time, road traffic is a rather complex process to manage, which is explained by the influence of many different internal and external environmental factors. The unpredictable and chaotic behavior of each vehicle in a traffic flow complicates predicting the transport situation and traffic management. This problem gave rise to several unsolved problems, including traffic congestion and road accident rates. The solution to these problems is connected with sustainably managing transport systems in terms of road traffic. However, numerous regularities between elements within the system should be understood in order to implement the management process. Unfortunately, the results of many previous studies often reflect only partial regularities and have limited functionality. Therefore, a new approach to urban traffic management is needed. As opposed to the existing solutions, the authors of this paper propose to implement management based on the regularities of changes in the chaos of the transport system. In this regard, the purpose of this research is to establish the relationship between road traffic chaos and road accident rates. The general methodological basis of this research is the system approach and its methods: analysis and synthesis. The theoretical studies were mostly based on the theories of chaos, dynamic systems, and traffic flows. The experimental studies were based on the theories of experimental design, probability, and mathematical statistics. To achieve this goal, a profound analysis covered studies on the sustainability of transport and dynamic systems, sociodynamics, and traffic. The authors proposed considering the relative entropy of lane occupancy at signal-controlled intersections as a measure for assessing traffic flow chaos and sustainability. Notably, as the main conclusions, the authors established regularities for the influence of entropy on the kinetic energy of traffic flows and injury risk. It also makes sense to emphasize that the initial data for the experiment were collected via real-time processing of video images using neural network technologies. These technologies will further allow for the implementation of traffic management and real-time forecasting of various events. Ultimately, the authors identified changes in injury risk depending on the level of road chaos. According to the authors, the obtained results can be used to improve the sustainability of urban transport systems. The research identified changes in injury risk depending on the level of road chaos, which could have significant implications for urban traffic management strategies.

Projections of private vehicle ownership, energy demand and vehicular emissions – a study of metropolitan cities in India

Urban agglomerations in India have witnessed significant growth in private vehicle ownership since the turn of this century. Intense urban road transport will have stern implications on air quality, GHG emissions, energy demands and, transport infrastructure. This study investigates the relationship between income and vehicle ownership rate for five metropolitan cities in India using a non-linear Gompertz functional framework. Medium-term scenarios of private vehicle (cars and two-wheelers) ownership, vehicle stock, energy demand and tailpipe emissions under multiple scenarios are envisaged by deriving ownership saturation based on city area and land use pattern. The results show a significant increase in vehicle stock resulting in a substantial rise in energy demand and vehicular emissions by 2035. However, the adoption of electric vehicles is expected to truncate this surge. Delhi is projected to saturate during this period while other cities are expected to saturate after 2035. The study also highlights transport policy and investment spheres to reduce private vehicle dependency.

Accelerating urban road transportation electrification: planning, technology, economic and implementation factors in converting gas stations into fast charging stations

Accelerating urban road transportation electrification: planning, technology, economic and implementation factors in converting gas stations into fast charging stations

Analysing the Capacity of the Urban Road Transport Network Using a Dynamic Assignment Model in the Bistrița - Târgu Mureș Geographical Axis

Analysing the Capacity of the Urban Road Transport Network Using a Dynamic Assignment Model in the Bistrița - Târgu Mureș Geographical Axis. Network capacity in a transportation system becomes an important measurement for transport planning and management because it addresses its capability to satisfy an efficient network traffic flow reducing the inefficiency of congestion phenomena. This work provides a discussion of road urban transport network capacity including existing definitions in literature and the validation of new measurement methods. The study explores some of the properties of network-wide traffic flow relationships in a large-scale complex urban street network using real-time simulated results obtained from a dynamic traffic assignment model, periodically updated by data from radar sensors through rolling horizon technics. The basic variables used in the methodology, such as network flows and speeds, are characterized using a network model calibrated in the urban area of the geographical axis Bistrița-Târgu Mureș. For a comprehensive yet simple analysis, equations, and graphs are utilized to resume the obtained results related to different days and several time intervals of the day. The focus of sustainable urban transportation development lies in realizing the untapped capacity potential of the existing road network and enhancing its operational efficiency without expanding its physical footprint. To quantify the supply capacity of road networks in mountainous cities, this paper converts the problem of solving the capacity of road networks into the problem of solving the minimum cut set in road networks from the perspective of road network capacity, using the idea of the auxiliary diagram method in graph theory. This procedure proved to be suitable for investigating the properties of network-level traffic flow relationships and concluding remarks include suggestions for further research in this highly promising area. Keywords: Traffic-flow relation, Intelligent Transport System, Dynamic assignment model, Road urban transport network, road network capacity, Geographic Axis Bistrița - Tg. Mures

A decision support framework to evaluate the sustainability performance of urban road transportation.

This study proposes a decision support framework (DSF) based on two data envelopment analysis (DEA) models in order to evaluate the urban road transportation of countries for sustainable performance management during different years. The first model considers different years independently while the second model, which is a type of network model, takes into account all the years integrated. A multi-objective programming model under two types of uncertainties is then developed to solve the proposed DEA models based on a revised multi-choice goal programming (GP) approach. The efficiency scores are measured based on the data related to several major European countries and the factors including the level of freight and passenger transportation, level of greenhouse gas emissions, level of energy consumption, and road accidents which are addressed as the main evaluation factors. Eventually, the two proposed models are compared in terms of interpretation and final achievements. The results reveal that the efficiency scores of countries are different under deterministic/uncertain conditions and according to the structure of the evaluation model. Furthermore, efficiency changes are not necessarily the same as productivity changes. The high interpretability (up to 99.6%) of the models demonstrates the reliability of DSF for decision-making stakeholders in the transport sector. Furthermore, a set of managerial analyses is conducted based on different parameters of the performance evaluation measures for these countries including the productivity changes during the period under consideration, resilience of the countries, detection of the benchmark countries, ranking of different countries, and detection of the patterns for improving the transportation system.

Exploring Information communication Technology-enabled travel Pattern in a city region of India

ABSTRACTInformation and Communication Technology (ICT) is advocated to contribute to sustainable transportation by prompting a change in travel patterns. Therefore, using an ICT-enabled city region in India as the study context, the objectives of the study were to examine the influence of ICT on travel patterns in city regions and explore the strategies to enhance ICT usage for positively changed travel patterns. Findings suggest that definite linkages between ICT usage and travel patterns exist. An increase in ICT usage in daily activities of people will enable a significant reduction in trip generation, travel distance and travel time. Strategic interventions including enhancing networking and ICT connectivity, provisioning free Wi-Fi hot spots at important nodal points, and enabling the availability of real-time road transportation-related information can enhance ICT usage leading to a positively changed travel pattern. This is likely to improve traffic movement and reduce congestion contributing to sustainable urban road transportation.

Research on the contribution of metro-based freight to reducing urban transportation exhaust emissions

Most carbon emissions come from cities, including mainly human activities in the fields of the urban economy, urban construction, and urban transportation. In terms of urban transportation, a truck produces far more carbon emissions than does a car. From the perspective of reducing the freight amount of urban road transport, underground logistics systems are a feasible solution in the future. Currently, metro-based freight is easier to implement, and the redundant transport capacity of the urban metro during off-peak hours can be put to good use. In addition, the pressure of the ground freight can be alleviated. Against the background of the coordinated operation mode of metro-based freight and ground freight, this study aims to measure the contribution of metro-based freight to reducing urban transportation carbon emissions by using the optimization method of metro passenger–freight coordinated transportation and traffic flow theory. Taking the Beijing Metro Batong Line as an example, the results of experiments show that the coordinated operation mode can significantly reduce urban transportation exhaust emissions.

Analysis and Comparative Study of Signalized and Unsignalized Intersection Operations and Energy-Emission Characteristics Based on Real Vehicle Data

With the development of the economy, urban road transportation has been continuously improved, and the number of motor vehicles has also increased significantly, leading to serious energy consumption issues. As critical nodes in the urban road transportation network, intersections have become a focal point of research on vehicle energy consumption. To investigate whether traffic signal lights affect fuel consumption and emissions, this study analyzed the operating characteristics, fuel consumption, and emissions of intersections with and without traffic signal lights using real-world vehicle data. The data from the INTERACTION dataset for both signalized intersection VA and unsignalized intersection MA are used in the study, with a time duration of 3200 s. The VT-micro energy consumption and emissions model was applied to calculate and comprehensively analyze the vehicle flow, fuel consumption, and emissions. Additionally, the study compared the fuel consumption and emissions for different driving scenarios, including straight through, left turn, right turn, and U-turn, within a single traffic signal cycle. The results revealed that at signalized intersections, the average fuel consumption per vehicle was 26.54 L/100 km, NOx emissions were 68.76 g/100 km, and CO2 emissions were 61.07 g/100 km. In contrast, at unsignalized intersections, the average fuel consumption per vehicle was 46.88 L/100 km, NOx emissions were 149.26 g/100 km, and CO2 emissions were 107.16 g/100 km. The study indicated that for traffic volumes between 50 and 103 vehicles per 100 s, signalized intersections demonstrated better fuel consumption and emission performance than unsignalized intersections. Signalized intersections could accommodate larger traffic volumes and provide enhanced traffic safety. In conclusion, the findings of this study are important for urban traffic planning and environmental policies. They provide a scientific basis for reducing fuel consumption and emissions and improving road traffic efficiency. Due to the advantages of signalized intersections in terms of energy consumption and emissions, future urban traffic planning should consider more signal light controls to achieve energy savings, emission reduction, and improved traffic operation efficiency.

Mitigation strategies for controlling urban particulate pollution from traffic congestion: Road expansion and road public transport

The mismatch between urban transportation demands and local transportation supplies in municipal regions may cause serious traffic congestion and high vehicle exhaust emissions (VEEs). Although it has been found that road expansion and the provision of road public transport can mitigate traffic congestion and VEEs, the effectiveness of these public strategies in alleviating traffic congestion-related VEEs has been empirically compared in few studies. With the use of a panel dataset for 260 prefecture-level cities in China from 2013 to 2018, we fill this gap via empirically examining the effects of several popular strategies that promote the efficiency of urban road transportation, including road expansion and road public transport provision, on urban air pollution of fine particulate matter (PM2.5). Then we further investigate metrics measured by passenger and freight volumes based on local urban road coverage that can suitably reflect the mismatch degree between local transportation demands and supplies. The empirical results indicated a positive and statistically significant correlation between urban PM2.5 levels and road expansion but not between PM2.5 levels and road public transport, suggesting that road expansion may unintentionally increase the transportation volume and thus local PM2.5 levels. Importantly, we found that the passenger and freight volumes per unit road length are negatively and significantly correlated with the local particulate pollution concentration across different model specifications, while the passenger and freight volumes of road transportation do not directly affect local PM2.5 levels. We also employed a series of robustness tests to overcome the concerns associated with measurement errors, omitted variable biases, model misspecifications and endogeneity, and consistent results were obtained. These results indicated that when facing limited public budgets, the passenger and freight volumes per unit road length should be considered to measure the effectiveness of road infrastructure investments in alleviating local particulate pollution caused by traffic congestion.

Attention based spatio-temporal graph convolutional network with focal loss for crash risk evaluation on urban road traffic network based on multi-source risks

The urban road transportation has presented a high probability of crash occurrence, and the aim of the present study is to evaluate the crash risk for urban road networks. However, the irregular structure of urban road networks, the high-dimensional spatio-temporal correlations among multi-source risks (i.e., the contributing risks from traffic flow, meteorological conditions, road design, and so forth), and the issue of data imbalance have brought challenges to this topic. To solve these issues, an Attention based Spatio-Temporal Graph Convolutional Network (ASTGCN) model with focal loss function is used for the first time to evaluate crash risk on an urban road network. This work can be summarized as (1) adopting the spatio-temporal graph convolution structure to capture the spatio-temporal properties and characterize the multi-source risks; (2) utilizing an attention mechanism network to address the critical contributing risks during crash risk evaluation; (3) introducing the focal loss function to improve the model performance impacted by the imbalanced data; and (4) investigating the different contributions of multi-source risks to model performance. The evaluation performance is tested in a real-world urban road traffic network. The raw data consists of 1239 crash records with corresponding datasets of traffic flow characteristics, meteorological conditions, road attributes and the topological structure of the road network. At the same time, three baseline models Artificial Neural Network (ANN), Random Forest (RF), and Deep Spatio-Temporal Graph Convolutional Network (DSTGCN) are compared to the proposed ASTGCN on the same datasets. Overall, the results show that ASTGCN outperforms the baseline models in several evaluation metrics. ASTGCN with focal loss function further improves performance by tackling the issues of dataset imbalance. Additionally, it is also found that the traffic flow risk is most crucial to model performance. The findings of the present study indicate that the proposed model can efficiently evaluate dynamic crash risk for urban road networks, which will benefit the safety management of urban road transportation.