Effectiveness of enforcement resources in the highway patrol in reducing fatality rates

Motor vehicle crashes are a leading cause of death in the United States. Wyoming initiated a safety study to investigate the underlying causes of high crash rates since it has one of the highest fatality rates in the nation. Research has shown relationships between increased enforcement activity and road crash/fatality reduction. However, little research has attempted to quantitatively measure the impact of various forms of police enforcement, such as the percentage of enforcement time and the quantity of resources, on fatality rate. Therefore, this study was set forward to fill this gap. Data from the highway patrol in Wyoming and the surrounding states were used in this study. Although Wyoming and these nearby states have very similar features in terms of geography and weather, they are different in terms of road mileage and traffic. Therefore, the data was normalized based on highway mileage and miles traveled. Enforcement efforts were compared in terms of allocated enforcement budget, number of sworn officers, and time spent patrolling. The results indicated that there are negative relationships between fatality rate and budget, number of officers, and active hours on the field. This paper also investigated which variable is the best predictor of fatality rate. The results indicated that time spent on the field by highway patrol officers is the best indicator of fatality rate. It was found that although some states like Wyoming have a higher number of sworn officers, they spend less time actively enforcing highway safety. This study provides information needed for authorities to allocate more funding to the highway patrol, and for the highway patrol to spend more time on the road.     

基于奇异谱分析的动态称重系统算法研究

针对目前动态称重系统称重误差较大的现状,设计了基于奇异谱分析的动态称重系统。在汽车综合试验场,根据设计的动态称重系统及所选用的压电石英称重传感器的特点,采用两轴车辆及多轴车辆在S形通过、高速行驶刹车通过、不同车速通过的三种情况下采集称重数据。利用车辆的轴重与采集的信号所包围的面积关系计算得到车重,并将奇异谱分析(SSA)算法应用于动态称重系统的数据处理中。试验结果表明:SSA算法与传统的小波分析算法相比能够明显降低称重误差,可广泛推广应用于动态称重系统中。     

A New Method for Accurately Estimating the Weight of Moving Vehicles Using Piezoelectric Sensors and Adaptive-footprint Tire Model

Summary This paper presents new methods for estimating the axle weight of a moving vehicle, using two piezoelectric sensors and adaptive-footprint tire model. It is more difficult to weigh vehicles in motion accurately than to weigh standing vehicles. The difficulties in weighing moving vehicles result from sensor limitations as well as dynamic loading effects induced by vehicle/pavement interactions. For example, two identical vehicles with the same weight will generate sensor signals that differ in the shape and the peak value, depending the tire pressure, vehicle speed, road roughness, and sensor characteristics. This paper develops a method that is much less sensitive to these variable factors in determining the axle weight of a moving vehicle. In the developed method, first the piezoelectric sensor signal is reconstructed using the inverse dynamics of a high-pass filter representing the piezoelectric sensor. Then, the reconstructed signal, is normalized, using the nominal road/tire contact length obtained using an adaptive-footprint tire model, and then integrated. Experiments are performed with 3 vehicles of known weight ranging from 1,400 kg to 28,040 kg. The developed method is compared to two other algorithms. Results show that the developed method is most consistent and accurate.     

A New Method for Accurately Estimating the Weight of Moving Vehicles Using Piezoelectric Sensors and Adaptive-footprint Tire Model

Summary This paper presents new methods for estimating the axle weight of a moving vehicle, using two piezoelectric sensors and adaptive-footprint tire model. It is more difficult to weigh vehicles in motion accurately than to weigh standing vehicles. The difficulties in weighing moving vehicles result from sensor limitations as well as dynamic loading effects induced by vehicle/pavement interactions. For example, two identical vehicles with the same weight will generate sensor signals that differ in the shape and the peak value, depending the tire pressure, vehicle speed, road roughness, and sensor characteristics. This paper develops a method that is much less sensitive to these variable factors in determining the axle weight of a moving vehicle. In the developed method, first the piezoelectric sensor signal is reconstructed using the inverse dynamics of a high-pass filter representing the piezoelectric sensor. Then, the reconstructed signal, is normalized, using the nominal road/tire contact length obtained using an adaptive-footprint tire model, and then integrated. Experiments are performed with 3 vehicles of known weight ranging from 1,400 kg to 28,040 kg. The developed method is compared to two other algorithms. Results show that the developed method is most consistent and accurate.     

Development of algorithms for commercial vehicle mass and road grade estimation

Estimation algorithms for road slope angle and vehicle mass are presented for commercial vehicles. It is well known that vehicle weight and road grade significantly affect the longitudinal motion of a commercial vehicle. However, it is very difficult to measure the weight and road slope angle in real time because of lack of sensor technology. In addition, the total weight of a commercial vehicles varies depending on the freight. In this study, the road grade and vehicle mass estimation algorithms are proposed using the RLS (Recursive Least Square) method and only the in-vehicle sensors. The proposed algorithms are verified in experiments using a commercial vehicle under various conditions.     

Total dynamic response of a PSS vehicle negotiating asymmetric road excitations

A planar suspension system (PSS) is a novel automobile suspension system in which an individual spring–damper strut is implemented in both the vertical and longitudinal directions, respectively. The wheels in a vehicle with such a suspension system can move back and forth relative to the chassis. When a PSS vehicle experiences asymmetric road excitations, the relative longitudinal motion of wheels with respect to the chassis in two sides of the same axle are not identical, and thus the two wheels at one axle will not be aligned in the same axis. The total dynamic responses, including those of the bounce, pitch and the roll of the PSS vehicle, to the asymmetric road excitation may exhibit different characteristics from those of a conventional vehicle. This paper presents an investigation into the comprehensive dynamic behaviour of a vehicle with the PSS, in such a road condition, on both the straight and curved roads. The study was carried out using an 18 DOF full-car model incorporating a radial-spring tyre–ground contact model and a 2D tyre–ground dynamic friction model. Results demonstrate that the total dynamic behaviour of a PSS vehicle is generally comparable with that of the conventional vehicle, while PSS exhibits significant improvement in absorbing the impact forces along the longitudinal direction when compared to the conventional suspension system. The PSS vehicle is found to be more stable than the conventional vehicle in terms of the directional performance against the disturbance of the road potholes on a straight line manoeuvre, while exhibiting a very similar handling performance on a curved line.     

汽车油管式动态称重的仿真与分析

介绍了油管式汽车动态称重系统。运用VPG技术、利用动态显式非线性有限元分析软件LS-DYNA对某两轴货车满载驶过油管式称重仪的全过程进行了数值模拟。分析单/双胎、车速、油管内初始油压和管径等因素对传感器输出特性的影响。仿真分析结果与实车试验结果趋势一致,验证了仿真分析方法的正确性。     

公路重载运输的社会经济评估模型

为研究公路货运车辆重载运输对社会经济的影响,基于系统动力学理论建立了公路货运系统的仿真模型,通过仿真分析车辆载重程度对货运需求、车辆使用决策、车型演化、车辆运输成本以及路面性能的长期动态作用,继而进行公路重载运输的社会经济影响评估。基于安徽数据的仿真结果表明,在货运车辆普遍重载的条件下,生产要素价格的变动、路面厚度的提高和路面维修间隔期的改变均不会对车流轴载水平乃至公路货运系统的运行产生根本性影响,系统表现出较高的稳定性。此时,车辆载重标准的引入是极为必要的。在实施严格的车辆载重标准后,系统行为又表现出以下重要特征:反直观性、远期与近期利益相矛盾、系统绩效受产业结构的影响较大。     

Improving truck safety: Potential of weigh-in-motion technology

Trucks exceeding the legal mass limits increase the risk of traffic accidents and damage to the infrastructure. They also result in unfair competition between transport modes and companies. It is therefore important to ensure truck compliance to weight regulation. New technologies are being developed for more efficient overload screening and enforcement. Weigh-in-Motion (WIM) technologies allow trucks to be weighed in the traffic flow, without any disruption to operations. Much progress has been made recently to improve and implement WIM systems, which can contribute to safer and more efficient operation of trucks.     

A vehicle ABS adaptive sliding-mode control algorithm based on the vehicle velocity estimation and tyre/road friction coefficient estimations

A sliding-mode observer is designed to estimate the vehicle velocity with the measured vehicle acceleration, the wheel speeds and the braking torques. Based on the Burckhardt tyre model, the extended Kalman filter is designed to estimate the parameters of the Burckhardt model with the estimated vehicle velocity, the measured wheel speeds and the vehicle acceleration. According to the estimated parameters of the Burckhardt tyre model, the tyre/road friction coefficients and the optimal slip ratios are calculated. A vehicle adaptive sliding-mode control (SMC) algorithm is presented with the estimated vehicle velocity, the tyre/road friction coefficients and the optimal slip ratios. And the adjustment method of the sliding-mode gain factors is discussed. Based on the adaptive SMC algorithm, a vehicle's antilock braking system (ABS) control system model is built with the Simulink Toolbox. Under the single-road condition as well as the different road conditions, the performance of the vehicle ABS system is simulated with the vehicle velocity observer, the tyre/road friction coefficient estimator and the adaptive SMC algorithm. The results indicate that the estimated errors of the vehicle velocity and the tyre/road friction coefficients are acceptable and the vehicle ABS adaptive SMC algorithm is effective. So the proposed adaptive SMC algorithm can be used to control the vehicle ABS without the information of the vehicle velocity and the road conditions.     

Using the lead vehicle as preview sensor in convoy vehicle active suspension control

Both ride quality and roadholding of actively suspended vehicles can be improved by sensing the road ahead of the vehicle and using this information in a preview controller. Previous applications have used look-ahead sensors mounted on the front bumper to measure terrain beneath. Such sensors are vulnerable, potentially confused by water, snow, or other soft obstacles and offer a fixed preview time. For convoy vehicle applications, this paper proposes using the overall response of the preceding vehicle(s) to generate preview controller information for follower vehicles. A robust observer is used to estimate the states of a quarter-car vehicle model, from which road profile is estimated and passed on to the follower vehicle(s) to generate a preview function. The preview-active suspension, implemented in discrete time using a shift register approach to improve simulation time, reduces sprung mass acceleration and dynamic tyre deflection peaks by more than 50% and 40%, respectively. Terrain can change from one vehicle to the next if a loose obstacle is dislodged, or if the vehicle paths are sufficiently different so that one vehicle misses a discrete road event. The resulting spurious preview information can give suspension performance worse than that of a passive or conventional active system. In this paper, each vehicle can effectively estimate the road profile based on its own state trajectory. By comparing its own road estimate with the preview information, preview errors can be detected and suspension control quickly switched from preview to conventional active control to preserve performance improvements compared to passive suspensions.     

Improving the efficiency of weigh in motion systems through optimized allocating truck checking oriented procedure

In the present paper, an effective procedure is proposed to determine the best location(s) for installing Weigh in Motion systems (WIM). The main objective is to determine locations for best performance, defined as the maximum number of once-checked trucks' axle loads and minimizing unnecessary actions. The aforesaid method consists of two main stages, including solving shortest path algorithm and selecting the best location for installing WIM(s). A proper mathematical model has also been developed to achieve objective function. The number of once-checked trucks, unnecessary actions and average installing costs are defined as criteria measures. The proposed procedure was applied in a road network using experimental data, while the results were compared with the usual methods of locating enforcement facilities. Finally, it is concluded that the proposed procedure seems to be more efficient than the traditional methods and local experts' points of view.     

Vehicle velocity estimation using effective inertia for an in-wheel electric vehicle

In this study, a vehicle velocity estimation algorithm for an in-wheel electric vehicle is proposed. This algorithm estimates the vehicle velocity using the concept of effective inertia, which is based on the motor torque, the angular velocity of each wheel and vehicle acceleration. Effective inertia is a virtual mass that changes according to the state of a vehicle, such as acceleration, deceleration, turning or driving on a low friction road. The performance of the proposed vehicle velocity estimation algorithm was verified in various conditions that included straight driving, circle driving and low friction road driving using the in-wheel electric vehicle that was equipped with an in-wheel system in each of its rear wheels.     

Automatic generation of the non-holonomic equations of motion for vehicle stability analysis

The mathematical analysis of vehicle stability has been utilised as an important tool in the design, development, and evaluation of vehicle architectures and stability controls. This paper presents a novel method for automatic generation of the linearised equations of motion for mechanical systems that is well suited to vehicle stability analysis. Unlike conventional methods for generating linearised equations of motion in standard linear second order form, the proposed method allows for the analysis of systems with non-holonomic constraints. In the proposed method, the algebraic constraint equations are eliminated after linearisation and reduction to first order. The described method has been successfully applied to an assortment of classic dynamic problems of varying complexity including the classic rolling coin, the planar truck–trailer, and the bicycle, as well as in more recent problems such as a rotor–stator and a benchmark road vehicle with suspension. This method has also been applied in the design and analysis of a novel three-wheeled narrow tilting vehicle with zero roll-stiffness. An application for determining passively stable configurations using the proposed method together with a genetic search algorithm is detailed. The proposed method and software implementation has been shown to be robust and provides invaluable conceptual insight into the stability of vehicles and mechanical systems.     

基于改进人工势场的自动驾驶汽车弯道超车动态路径规划

动态路径规划是自动驾驶汽车避障控制的关键技术。针对自动驾驶汽车弯道超车工况，建立基于改进人工势场(Artificial Potential Field, APF)的动态路径规划方法。为使基于APF的动态路径规划方法能运用于包含弯曲道路的复杂交通环境，将已在直道环境验证过的道路APF函数通过极坐标系与笛卡尔坐标系的相互转换，建立考虑道路曲率的弯曲道路APF函数。针对根据车辆质心位置判断车辆碰撞风险方法存在的缺陷，提出考虑车辆体积的碰撞风险预判方法，建立综合考虑车辆位置、速度和体积的障碍车辆APF函数。基于弯曲道路APF和改进障碍车辆APF，建立道路环境综合APF，引导车辆实现弯道超车。为避免目标函数中子目标相互干涉，提高弯道超车安全性，提出根据本车与障碍车辆相对位置关系自适应调整权重矩阵的方法。基于Carsim/Simulink联合仿真平台，分别在静态障碍车辆和动态障碍车辆2种工况下，验证自动驾驶汽车弯道超车动态路径规划的有效性。研究结果表明：所建立的弯曲道路APF能引导车辆转弯行驶，避免冲出车道；目标函数权重自适应调整方法能根据超车过程动态调整子目标的权重，规划出符合道路交通安全法规的路径，避免车辆超车时提前折返原车道，提高了超车安全性；考虑车辆体积的障碍车辆APF提高了车辆碰撞风险的预判精度，有效避免碰撞事故发生。     

人工神经网络在车辆行驶称重技术中的应用

车辆行驶称重技术是通过测量分析车辆轮胎与路面作用力,从而计算车辆的静态载荷和静态轴载等相关参数的车辆载荷检测技术。基于人工神经网络综合分析了影响轮胎作用力的各个因素的影响关系,通过自行研制的油管传感器式车辆行驶称重仪进行了相关试验验证,达到了预定的精度和实用要求。     

考虑交通流动态分布的路面养护最优决策

为准确评估路面全生命周期用户成本以制定最优的路面养护策略，提出基于网络交通流均衡条件的路面养护多阶段动态规划最优决策模型，通过交通流的仿真，模拟用户成本在路网养护前、后以及生命周期各阶段的动态变化，并设计启发式迭代算法。该模型最小化的目标函数包含了生命周期的养护成本、用户成本、路面资产残值，约束条件主要由交通量守恒约束条件、养护预算约束、路面性能转移约束等。为证明模型的有效性，以一个具有10个路段的路网为例，采用提出的模型制定该路网连续20年的最优养护决策方案。研究结果表明：在每年养护预算确定的情况下，全生命周期路面养护最优方案是一个决策方案组合，该最优方案可以提高养护资金使用效率并有效减少用户成本，可为路面养护管理提供决策支持。通过对不同养护约束情景下的全生命周期用户成本的模拟表明：随着养护预算的增加，养护路段增多，导致用户成本增加，使养护成本的边际收益发生递减，养护预算在理论上具有一个最优值，并且养护成本收益与养护预算之间呈倒U形函数关系。     

超薄平板式动态称重系统

通过限定车辆轴载来控制车辆超限超载,采用动态采集"轮"或"轴"载荷来监测车辆轴载的质量、总重.从安装形式看,石英式称重条、弯曲式称重板是一种"路面直埋"称重系统产品,整车式或轴组式称重系统是一种"基坑吊装"称重系统,均需破坏路基(包含大面积路面翻新硬化处理)为代价,存在安全性差、隐患较多、施工难度大、周期长、保养困难等...     

Preview suspension control for a full tracked vehicle

In this study, preview control algorithms for the active and semi-active suspension systems of a full tracked vehicle (FTV) are designed based on a 3-D.O.F model and evaluated. The main issue of this study is to make the ride comfort characteristics of a fast moving tracked vehicle better to keep an operator’s driving capability. Since road wheels almost trace the profiles of the road surface as long as the track doesn’t depart from the ground, the preview information can be obtained by measuring only the absolute position or velocity of the first road wheel. Simulation results show that the performance of the sky-hook suspension system almost follows that of full state feedback suspension system and the on-off semi-active system carries out remarkable performance with the combination of 12 on-off semi-active suspension units. The results simulated with 1^st and 2^nd weighting sets mean that the suspension system combined with the soft type of inner suspension and hard type of outer suspension can carry out better ride comfort characteristics than that with identical suspensions. The full tracked vehicle (FTV) system is uncontrollable and the system is split into controllable and uncontrollable subspace using singular value decomposition transformation. Frequency response curves to four types of inputs, such as heaving, pitching, rolling, and warping inputs, also demonstrate the merits of preview control in ride comfort. All the frequency characteristic responses confirm the continuous time results.     

超速行为干预措施研究现状及发展趋势

为了提出能够有效遏制超速行为的干预措施,明确已有超速行为干预措施的实际效果、适用条件、优缺点及结合措施效果,对该领域内相关文献进行了系统性综述。根据系统性综述和元分析首选报告准则（PRISMA）,将超速行为及其干预措施作为关键词,分别从11个电子数据库中搜索与超速抓拍系统、反超速宣传、超速警告标志和智能超速干预系统相关文献,通过构建文献质量评价指标体系对这些文献进行评估,筛选出101篇相关文献,并对其研究结果进行了叙述性地综合分析。研究结果表明：超速抓拍系统、反超速宣传、超速警告标志及智能超速干预系统具有不同程度的超速干预效果,且受一些道路交通环境条件及人为因素的影响。具体地,对于超速抓拍系统,区间式超速抓拍系统的干预效果最好,而移动式超速抓拍系统最差;对于反超速宣传,户外广告的超速干预效果最好,但印刷类广告作用不大;对于超速警告标志,超速张贴标志具有较显著的干预效果;警告型动态速度显示标志的超速干预效果优于标准型动态速度显示标志;对于智能超速干预系统,强制型智能超速干预系统的超速干预效果最佳,自愿型智能超速干预系统效果最差;对于结合措施,多数结合措施较单个措施的超速干预效果更好。总体而言,超速抓拍系统和智能超速干预系统的超速干预效果最好,超速警告标志次之,反超速宣传效果较差,结合措施可增强干预效果。上述结果可为超速行为干预措施的选择或提出奠定理论基础。针对已有超速干预措施的局限性及影响因素尚不明朗的问题,后续研究需优化试验或调查方案,进一步探究超速干预措施的效果及影响因素,并基于大数据（如车辆轨迹、视频数据）提出新的干预措施。