A Queuing and Statistical Analysis of Freeway Bottleneck Formation

ASCE Journal of Transportation Engineering, Vol. 130, No. 6, pp. 787-795, November/December 2004

33 Pages Posted: 11 Sep 2007

See all articles by Shantanu Das

Shantanu Das

affiliation not provided to SSRN

David Matthew Levinson

affiliation not provided to SSRN

Abstract

A modified approach to treat traffic flow parameters (flow, density and speed) has been introduced in this paper. A queuing analysis has been conducted on traffic flow data on Interstate 94 in the Minneapolis-St. Paul metro area. A methodology has been developed to calibrate loop detector count data. Corrected flow data has been subjected to analysis using queuing analysis to compute densities and speeds on freeway sections. Statistical analysis identifies 'active bottleneck' locations on freeways and sections where bottlenecks occur because of disturbances caused by downstream bottlenecks propagating backwards in the form of shockwaves. A sample of six days on Interstate 94 was considered for the analysis. Our analysis reveals that the same section cannot always be characterized as a 'bottleneck' location; at some times it is active and at others, it is subject to downstream bottlenecks. Traffic flow characteristics change and that leads to changing situations on each freeway section.

Keywords: Ramp Meter, Inductive Loop Detector (ILD), Flow Conservation, Active Bottleneck

Suggested Citation

Das, Shantanu and Levinson, David Matthew, A Queuing and Statistical Analysis of Freeway Bottleneck Formation. ASCE Journal of Transportation Engineering, Vol. 130, No. 6, pp. 787-795, November/December 2004, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1010503

Shantanu Das

affiliation not provided to SSRN ( email )

David Matthew Levinson (Contact Author)

affiliation not provided to SSRN

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