Speed behaviour of car drivers: A statistical analysis of acceptance of changes in speed policies in the Netherlands

Lowering the speed of car drivers will have positive impacts on environmental pollution and the number of road accidents. It is therefore a potentially interesting policy option for governments which want to reduce negative externalities of transport. In this paper, the acceptance of such policies is analysed by means of a survey questionnaire among car drivers and public transport users. First, an analysis is presented on the general speed behaviour, the behaviour on distinct road types, the acceptance of lower limits, and the acceptance and perception of electronic speed limiters. Next, a statistical analysis of subgroups is carried out. It is concluded that the speed of car drivers is, in general, not considered to be a main problematic issue by drivers and non-drivers; therefore, there is little scope for the acceptance of changes in speed policies. When speed policies are changed (lower limits), it seems to be most effective to emphasize safety aspects in order to increase the support of the public. However, psychological factors of speed behaviour may play an important role in this respect.     

Critical Speed and Limit Speed in Phenomena of Lateral Instability on Railway Vehicles

A comparison between theoretical calculations on dynamic lateral behaviour of railway vehicles and experimental results shows quite a sizeable difference between the calculated critical speed and the actual speed at which side impact phenomena will repeatedly occur between wheel flange and rail (running speed limit), such impact speed being remarkably lower than calculated.

Another typical experimental aspect is that the running speed limit will considerably vary for the same vehicle depending on the test track conditions. Such difference is usually attributed to alterations of the wheel-rail contact surfaces, only.

This paper will discuss some concurrent causes which may prove far from negligible, such as the effects of track defects, an amplification of the dynamic lateral displacement between wheel and rail on approaching the critical speed, the track mechanical properties, and in particular the track lateral rigidity.

The influence of some geometrical factors typical of the wheel-rail contact, such as side clearance and linearized conicity, will also be discussed. The approach is based on the application of statistical methods to dynamic linear systems.     

Optimal Control of a Vehicle Suspension Incorporating the Time Delay between Front and Rear Wheel Inputs

An optimal control law for a vehicle suspension is developed using a discrete linear quadratic regulator framework. The time delay between the disturbance due to the road at the front and rear wheels is incorporated into the model, and it is shown that the optimal control law requires information gathered at the front wheels. A comparison is made between the optimal control law and a suboptimal one which does not incorporate front wheel road information.     

Static and Dynamic Stability of a Class of Three-Axle Railway Vehicles Possessing Perfect Steering

For railway vehicles having coned wheels mounted on solid axles there is, in general, a conflict between stability of lateral deviations from the motion along the track and ability to steer round curves. However, the three-axle vehicle with zero bending stiffness and with shear elasticity between all wheelsets can satisfy the requirement of perfect steering and for a range of values of equivalent conicity possesses both static and dynamic stability. The static and dynamic stability of the most general form of symmetric three-axle vehicle is investigated, and stability criteria derived.     

An Active Suspension with Optimal Linear State Feedback

In this paper modern optimal control theory is applied to the design of an active suspension system for a motor vehicle. The road profile is assumed to be continuous and random with a power spectral density (P.S.D.) which varies inversely with the square of the frequency. The quadratic integral type performance index employed is a weighted sum of the integral squares of body acceleration, dynamic tyre deflection and relative body-to-axle displacement. A solution is obtained for the infinite time case which is both computationally and physically realizable as an active suspension in which the only continuous measurements required are the body absolute velocity and the body displacement relative to the road. The performance is compared with that of a conventional type passive suspension and found to be significantly better in practically all respects.     

Development of multimodal performance measures for transit systems in New York State

The New York State Department of Transportation was required to certify as to the economy and efficiency of transit operators participating in the State's public transportation operating assistance program. This paper describes the efforts undertaken to meet this mandate.Discussed are past efforts to link performance measures to funding programs; reasons for modifying measures which had been used in previous efforts; and some of the problems and issues raised by the use of such criteria. The paper identifies 15 performance measures being used by New York State in its evaluations, the actual ranges encountered in the transit operations being funded through the state program, and tentative acceptable and desirable levels of those measures which the Transportation Department is using in its evaluation. The role these measures play in the state's operating assistance policy decision process is also described.     

轨枕间距对钢轨波磨的影响

主要研究轨枕间距对钢轨波磨发展的影响。研究小半径曲线内轨的小矢跨比波磨。这些出现问题的曲线段属于西班牙毕尔巴鄂区域的地铁轨道,铺设着混凝土道床和两层STEDEF型支承垫层。当初始轨枕间距为1000mm时,仅有92万组轮对通过后所测得的波磨深度峰-峰值已经达到0.42mm。随后更换产生波磨的钢轨,比较列车通过时轨枕上方和轨间中部的内轨垂向、横向加速度。当轨枕间距为1000mm时,轨间中部出现频率为204和244Hz的强烈响应,在轨枕上方却未出现。在相邻轨枕中间铺设一个轨枕,使轨枕间距变为500mm,钢轨波磨停止发展。该结论是根据2年的观测结果得到的。     

Gain scheduled linear quadratic tracking system tuned optimally by covariance matrix adaption evolutionary strategy for automotive engine coldstart control

In this paper, a gain scheduled linear quadratic tracking system (LQTS) tuned optimally by an evolutionary strategy (ES) is devised to reduce the total tailpipe hydrocarbon (HC) emissions of an automotive engine over the coldstart period. As the engine’s behavior during coldstart operations is nonlinear, the system dynamics is clearly analyzed and represented by a number of separate linear models generated based on a coldstart model verified by experimental data. An independent LQTS is then implemented for each of these linear models. In this way, several control laws are created, and the corresponding gains are calculated for each of the independent control laws. ES is then used to tune the adjustable parameters of LQTSs to calculate the control inputs, namely air/fuel ratio (AFR) and spark timing (Δ), such that the resulting exhaust gas temperature (T _exh) and engine-out HC emissions (HC _raw) be close to a set of optimum profiles. This enables the controller reduce the cumulative tailpipe hydrocarbon emissions (HC _cum) to the highest possible extent. To demonstrate the acceptable performance of the proposed controller, an optimal controller derived from the Pontryagin’s minimum principle (PMP) is also taken into account. Based on the results of the conducted comparative study, it is shown that the proposed control technique has a very good performance, and also, can be easily used for real-time applications, as it consumes a remarkably trivial computational time for calculating the controlling commands.     

Analysis of Metropolitan Highway Capacity and the growth in vehicle miles of travel

A number of recent studies have examined the hypothesis of induced travel in an attempt to quantify the phenomenon (Hansen & Huang 1997; Noland, forthcoming). No study has yet attempted to adjust for potential simultaneity bias in the results. This study addresses this issue by the use of an instrumental variable (two stage least squares) approach. Metropolitan level data compiled by the Texas Transportation Institute for their annual congestion report is used in the analysis and urbanized land area is used as an instrument for lane miles of capacity. While this is not an ideal instrument, results still suggest a strong causal relationship but probably that most previous work has had an upward bias in the coefficient estimates. The effect of lane mile additions on VMT growth is forecast and found to account for about 15% of annual VMT growth with substantial variation between metropolitan areas. This effect appears to be closely correlated with percent growth in lane miles, suggesting that rapidly growing areas can attribute a greater share of their VMT growth to growth in lane miles.     

Impact phase in frontal vehicle-pedestrian collisions

The paper presents an alternative model developed in order to determine the pedestrian throw distance, taking into account ten distinct parameters. The collision dynamics, after the primary and secondary impact (pedestrian’s head hitting the vehicle windshield-hood area) between the vehicle and the pedestrian, entails the pedestrian ‘carrying’ phase onto the vehicle hood-windshield. Other parameters influencing the pedestrian throw distance, such as road inclination, friction coefficient between the pedestrian and the ground, vehicle and pedestrian mass, pedestrian launch angle are considered for the analysis. A comparison between the results obtained through the formula proposed in this paper and the results obtained by other researchers as well as a comparison with the results extracted from the casuistry analyzed by the authors on both accident reconstruction and laboratory tests is carried out.