Traffic assignment considering air quality

This paper presents a methodology of assigning traffic in a network with the consideration of air quality. Traffic assignment is formulated as an optimization problem considering travel cost and on-road emissions. It introduces a cell-based approach to model emission concentrations so that either the average or maximum emissions in a network can be considered in the optimization process. The emissions in a cell are modeled taking into consideration the influence of the emission sources from all cells in the network. A case study demonstrates that minimizing travel cost and reducing air pollutants may not be always achieved simultaneously. The traffic assignment procedure can effectively reduce emission concentrations at those locations with the worst air quality conditions, with only a marginal increase in travel time and average emission concentration in the network.     

Traffic assignment by trip type using volume restraint and link restraint for application in small urban areas

This research involved the development of a new traffic assignment model consisting of a set of procedures for an urbanized area with a population of 172,000. Historical, social, and economic data were used as input to conventional trip generation and trip distribution models to produce a trip table for network assignment. This fixed table was divided into three trip types: external-external trips, external-internal trips, and internal-internal trips. The methodology used to develop the new traffic assignment model assigned each of the trip types by varying the diversion of trips from the minimum path. External-external trips were assigned on a minimum path routing and external-internal trips were assigned with a slight diversion from the minimum path. Internal-internal trips were assigned with more diversion than external-internal trips and adjusted by utilizing iterative volume restraint and incremental link restraint. A statistical analysis indicated that assigning trips by trip types using trip diversion and volume and link restraint produces a significant improvement in the accuracy of the assigned traffic volumes.     

Traffic assignment in a two-dimensional continuous representation of a traffic network with flow-dependent speeds

The work deals with the assignment of traffic to a two-dimensional continuous representation of a traffic network. An important aspect of the treatment is that the reciprocal of the speed on each road in the network is at all times a linear function of the flow on that road. This speed-flow relationship is generalized to two-dimensional space using travel intensities and taking account of road densities, so that there is direct dependence of speeds upon flows at all points regardless of their location. There is also dependence of flows upon speeds at all points because Wardrop's first assignment principle is adopted. That is, for a given O-D pair, journey times on all routes actually used are identical, and less than journey times on all other possible routes. This results in the identification for each O-D pair of an “assignment zone”, an area within which all trips between that O-D pair are made, and beyond which no such trips are made. For a single O-D pair the assignment zone is identified by ?_m, the maximum angular divergence of a path from the straight line between O and D. Paths are then assumed to be bilinear so that for a single O-D pair the assignment zone is a parallelogram. Journey times, speeds, lateral displacement and other related quantities are obtained as functions of the flow Q between O and D. The work is extended to three O-D pairs located at the extremities of an equilateral triangle and four O-D pairs located at the corners of a square. At low flows these two configurations are trivial extensions of the single O-D pair problem because assignment zones do not overlap. At higher flows account is taken of this tendency to overlapping, so that although they do not overlap they do touch, becoming kite-shaped. Origins and destinations are assumed to be at the periphery of small circles of arbitrary radius. The work is inelegant to the extent that it involves a numerical integration but it is possible that this might eventually be circumvented.     

Walking infrastructure design assessment by continuous space dynamic assignment modeling

For the planning and design of walking infrastructure, characterized by the fact that the pedestrians can choose their paths freely in two‐dimensional space, applicability of traditional discrete network models is limited. This contribution puts forward an approach for user‐optimal dynamic assignment in continuous time and space for analyzing for instance walking infrastructure in a two‐dimensional space. Contrary to network‐based approaches, the theory allows the traffic units to choose from an infinite non‐countable set of paths through the considered space. The approach first determines the continuous paths using a path choice model. Then, origin‐destination flows are assigned and traffic conditions are calculated. The approach to determine a user‐optimal assignment is heuristic and consists of a sequence of all‐or‐nothing assignments. An application example is presented, showing dynamic user equilibrium traffic flows through a realistic transfer station. The example is aimed at illustrating the dynamic aspects of the modeling approach, such as anticipation on expected flow conditions, and predicted behavior upon catching or missing a connection.     

Rail freight traffic assignment

This paper describes an algorithm for routing freight over a rail network whose tracks are controlled by several carriers in a manner that follows current industrial practices. In particular, the freight is routed to minimize the number of interline transfers and to maximize the revenue division for the originating carrier. The algorithm is based upon generalizing a shortest path algorithm to allow vector valued link impedances.     

Multi-commodity traffic assignment by continuum approximation of network flow with variable demand

Consider a city with several highly compact central business districts (CBD), and the commuters’ destinations from each of them are dispersed over the whole city. Since at a particular location inside the city the traffic movements from different CBDs share the same space and do not cancel out each other as in conventional fluid flow problems albeit travelling in different directions, the traffic flows from a CBD to the destinations over the city are considered as one commodity. The interaction of the traffic flows among different commodities is governed by a cost–flow relationship. The case of variable demand is considered. The primal formulation of the continuum equilibrium model is given and proved to satisfy the user optimal conditions, and the dual formulation of the problem and its complementary conditions are also discussed. A finite element method is then employed to solve the continuum problem. A numerical example is given to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.     

Transit assignment under crowded conditions

This paper presents a transit assignment algorithm for crowded networks. Both congestion in vehicles and queuing at stations are explicitly taken into account in predicting passenger flows for a fixed pattern of origin-destination trip demands. The overflow effects due to insufficient capacity of transit lines are considered to be concentrated at transit stations, while the in-vehicle congestion effects (or discomforts) are considered to be dependent on in-vehicle passenger volume. Overflow delay at a transit station is dependent on the number of excess passengers required to wait for the next transit car. We use a logit model to determine the split between passengers that chose to wait for the next transit car and passengers that chose to board on the alternative transit lines. The proposed algorithm predicts how passenger will choose their optimal routes under both queuing and crowded conditions.     

弯道诱发道路交通安全事故分析

道路交通安全关乎我们的切身利益,其诱发因素颇多,而弯道是交通安全事故高发地。文章从汽车行驶特性、不良视距、会车超车等方面入手,分析弯道诱因与交通安全事故间的内在关系,并提出了基于GPS、GIS信息系统工程的智能交通预警思路,为交通安全控制提供理论参考依据。     

Potential-based dynamic pedestrian flow assignment

This study proposes a potential-based dynamic pedestrian flow assignment model to optimize the evacuation time needed for all pedestrians to leave an indoor or outdoor area with internal obstacles and multiple exits, e.g., railway station, air terminal, plaza, and park. In the model, the dynamic loading of pedestrian flows on a two-dimensional space is formulated by a cell transmission model, the movement of crowds is driven by space potential, and the optimization of evacuation time is solved by a proportional swapping process. In this way, the proposed model can be applied to not only efficiently optimize the evacuation process of a crowd with large scale but also recognize local congestion dynamics during crowd evacuation. Finally, a set of numerical examples are presented to show the proposed model’s effectiveness for optimizing crowd evacuation process and its application to design a class of variable guide sign systems.     

Preferences for alternative fuel vehicles by Dutch local governments

Using a choice model, we estimate the preferences for alternative fuel vehicles by Dutch local governments. The analysis shows that local governments are willing to pay between 25% and 50% extra for an alternative fuel vehicle without a serious loss of utility. Further, local emissions are an important criterion on which to base a decision, especially for municipalities and provinces. We also calculate the utility for a number of prominent alternative fuel vehicles. We find that show that local governments value the battery electric vehicle and biogas internal combustion engine equally. It is important, however, that the time to refuel for electric vehicles is reduced to about 30 min.     

Decomposing travel times measured by probe-based traffic monitoring systems to individual road segments

In probe-based traffic monitoring systems, traffic conditions can be inferred based on the position data of a set of periodically polled probe vehicles. In such systems, the two consecutive polled positions do not necessarily correspond to the end points of individual links. Obtaining estimates of travel time at the individual link level requires the total traversal time (which is equal to the polling interval duration) be decomposed. This paper presents an algorithm for solving the problem of decomposing the traversal time to times taken to traverse individual road segments on the route. The proposed algorithm assumes minimal information about the network, namely network topography (i.e. links and nodes) and the free flow speed of each link. Unlike existing deterministic methods, the proposed solution algorithm defines a likelihood function that is maximized to solve for the most likely travel time for each road segment on the traversed route. The proposed scheme is evaluated using simulated data and compared to a benchmark deterministic method. The evaluation results suggest that the proposed method outperforms the bench mark method and on average improves the accuracy of the estimated link travel times by up to 90%.     

交通要闻

东北亚陆海联运合作正式启动 2011年12月22日,中日韩俄东北亚陆海联运合作论坛和政府磋商会议在哈尔滨落幕。会议签署了《中日韩俄东北亚陆海联运合作磋商会议纪要》,标志着四国政府正式启动陆海联运合作。据悉,四国将建立由主管部门牵头的中日韩俄陆海联运政府间合作磋商机制,就签署中日韩俄政府间陆海联运协定进行磋商,每年召开一到两次会议,并于2012年在中国举行首次磋商会议。会议商定成立由四国交通运输管理部门牵头,研究机构、企业等方面的专家参加的专家组,     

交通要闻

十一届全国人大四次会议胜利闭幕 3月14上午,第十一届全国人民代表大会第四次会议在批准政府工作报告、国民经济和社会发展第十二个五年规划纲要,全国人火常委会工作报告及其他重要报告,圆满完成各项议程后在北京人民大会堂胜利闭幕。修改后的政府工作报告提出：统筹发展,加快构建便捷、安全、经济、高效的综合运输体系。代表提出的建议和议案涉及交通运输各个领域包括尽快出台《航道法》、治理城市交通拥堵、完善绿色通道政策、改革口岸管理体制、加强校车管理等内容。     

交通要闻

道路运输业"十二五"规划下发交通运输部日前正式下发道路运输业"十二五"规划,规划提出,到2015年,全国道路运输客运量、旅客周转量、货运量、货物周转量分别达到375亿人次、2.08万亿人公里、300亿吨、5.84万亿吨公里,国家公路运输枢纽客、货运站场     

交通要闻

国务院通过安全生产"十二五"规划国务院总理温家宝9月21日主持召开国务院常务会议,讨论通过了《安全生产"十二五"规划》。会议明确了"十二五"时期安全生产的六项主要任务:(一)完善企业安全保障体系。(二)完善政府安全监管和社会监督体系。(三)完善安全科技支撑体系。(四)完善法律法规和政策标准体系。     

交通风景

<正>徐祖远参加中国航海博物馆工作小组第三次会议2010年3月3日,交通运输部党组成员、副部长徐祖远在沪参加了中国航海博物馆工作小组第三次会议,与上海市副市长沈骏一起检查了陈展工程和文物征集情况,听取了博物馆筹建和开馆准备情况的汇报,并和与会的成员单位代表及专家审议了开馆仪式及相关事     

A frequency-based maritime container assignment model

This paper transfers the classic frequency-based transit assignment method of Spiess and Florian to containers demonstrating its promise as the basis for a global maritime container assignment model. In this model, containers are carried by shipping lines operating strings (or port rotations) with given service frequencies. An origin–destination matrix of full containers is assigned to these strings to minimize sailing time plus container dwell time at the origin port and any intermediate transhipment ports. This necessitated two significant model extensions. The first involves the repositioning of empty containers so that a net outflow of full containers from any port is balanced by a net inflow of empty containers, and vice versa. As with full containers, empty containers are repositioned to minimize the sum of sailing and dwell time, with a facility to discount the dwell time of empty containers in recognition of the absence of inventory. The second involves the inclusion of an upper limit to the maximum number of container moves per unit time at any port. The dual variable for this constraint provides a shadow price, or surcharge, for loading or unloading a container at a congested port. Insight into the interpretation of the dual variables is given by proposition and proof. Model behaviour is illustrated by a simple numerical example. The paper concludes by considering the next steps toward realising a container assignment model that can, amongst other things, support the assessment of supply chain vulnerability to maritime disruptions.