MWH IN NEW ZEALAND TMW and Technical Conference - Wellington 2004 Presented to: TMW and Technical Conference - Wellington 2004 Urie Bezuidenhout MSc.(Eng.) Presented by: Urie Bezuidenhout MSc.(Eng.) SENIOR TRANSPORT PLANNER AND ENGINEER Management of traffic USIng Control (MUSIC) - A Case Study

Structure of Presentation Case study Modelling approach Problems with Phase 1 New Modelling Approach -MUSIC- Success of MUSIC

Project Brief - Papakura DC To build an area-wide traffic model to test the impact of : converting priority to signalised junctions. Improvements to the road network And measure the degree of: traffic re-routing around the town centre and, the reduction of congestion at known bottlenecks

Modelling Steps Gt. South Clevedon CBD Tracks land-use model Saturn simulation/assignment Dracula microsimulation Model scenarios: Sc. 1 - Existing Sc. 2 - Proposed Sc. 3 - Optimised/Co-ordinated

Goal #1 - Traffic Diversion To measure the success of attracting more trips through the retail area. Compare post improvement (Sc.. 2) with existing (Sc.. 1) Sc. 2: Improvements GSR/Queen Railway/Broadway Clevedon/Prictor/ Marne GSR/Wood GSR/Opaheke Central Park link O’Shannessey

Goal #1 - Traffic Diversion Urban Designers to revitalise the CBD INCREASE TRAFFIC VOLUMES in CBD REDUCE TRAFFIC SPEEDS I.e Increase delay Traffic Volumes

BLUE = Less Traffic in Proposed GREEN = More Traffic in Proposed

Model Delay

GSR Route GSR/Wood St Great South Road Average Speed Future = 37kph Existing = 40kph GSR / Wood Junction

Clevedon/Prictor/Marne East - West Route Great South Road Clevedon/Prictor/Marne Junction Average Speed Future = 28kph Existing = 35kph

PM Peak Flows BLUE = Less Traffic in Proposed GREEN = More Traffic in Proposed

Saturn - Dracula advantage Same coding structure as Saturn Calibration and validation in Saturn Seamless transfer of information Graphical display of results in Saturn Can iterate between the two models Previous TRANSFUND research problem AIMSUN - TRANSYT - SCATS Microsimulation GSR/QueenGSR/O’ShannesseySubway

GSR/Queen Subway GSR/O’Shannessey

Outcomes of Phase 1 Conclusions –Isolated improvements failed to deliver –Inconsistent cycle times = diversion away from CBD –Poor co-ordination = gridlock and rat-runs

Phase 2 Work Recommendations –Need data on Parking usage –Develop benchmark for before - and - after Study –Need a strategy to implement schemes and consequent parking areas –Provide evidence of success of Council’s scheme

The PRACTICAL 1 Study Parking and Retail Activity Created by Traffic Improvements in the Centre Assigned to Last 1 MWH 1 MWH

Problems with Optimisation Assumes perfect driver knowledge Assumes high degree of cooperation between drivers Assumed fixed flow to produce signal plan Drivers react to plan change => plan out of date CHALLENGE How to predict Drivers Reponses? How to alter their Route Choices?

A Novel Approach to TDM York and Leeds Univ. and The Hague Group - EU Funded Research –3 Cities - York (59), Porto (28) & Thessaloniki (129) –Good results in York, Thessaloniki –Porto had implementation and monitoring difficulties Using SATURN’S OPTIMISATION = P0 Policy

The PO policy P0 is the well-known idea that signals can attempt to route vehicles onto roads, which have greater capacity by giving more green time to routes with greater capacity. In essence the method is to assign a “pressure” to each stage of a signal based upon the following formula: P = s 1 d 1 + s 2 d 2.… The higher the pressure = GIVE MORE GREEN TIME

The MUSIC Approach Set price P = 0 Assignment with delay- base price P Assess flows delays & Timings Produce Proactive Signal Timing plan Assess flows, delays and timing with Pricing removed Has best P been found ? Increase value of P Yes No Equilibrium Reached ? Update flows delays & Timings No STOP Yes IMPOSE DELAY PRICING OPTIMISE SIGNALS FREEZE SIGNALS ADJUST PRICING

Measuring the Objective.Objective 1 - (Traffic calming) –maximise traffic on the parking links and, –minimise flow on the retail links Objective 2 - (Appease retailers) –maximise traffic flow on the retail and parking links.

Monitoring flows Parking Retail

The MUSIC Approach Obj 2Obj 1

The MUSIC Results

Conclusion Conventional modelling approach not very efficient. Existing models applied in novel ways = superior results Using MUSIC approach to implement TDM Proper account of Driver Responses to change Important to define realistic objectives PROJECTS DO NOT STOP AT CONSTRUCTION ! Essential to have a MONITORING STRATEGY