• Journal of Korean Society of Transportation
• /
• v.18 no.5
• /
• pp.33-42
• /
• 2000

This Paper is a Part of research Project series to analyze unique traffic characteristics observable within weaving sections on urban freeways. The research objectives were to establish with headway distribution and maximum Passing volume on weaving sections the basis of weaving designs that can promote safety and efficiency. Until now, when one wants to check the maximum Passing volume on weaving sections, it is taken for granted using headway distribution of freeway basic section. However. it was suspected in this research that for weaving sections different form of headway distribution had better be used. To prove this, field surveys were made to count headway intervals which supposedly were influenced not only by freeway basic section flows but also by weaving flows and later on used to develop headway distribution for weaving sections. For validation of the developed headway distribution, $x^2$-test was applied to three different data set of observed headways, currently used headway distribution for basic sections(Pearson Type III distribution) and new headway distribution. The result indicated new headway distribution as the most appropriate distribution form. Also, maximum passing volume within weaving sections was calculated based on new headway distribution and compared with Drew's maximum Passing volume.

• Journal of Korean Society of Transportation
• /
• v.19 no.6
• /
• pp.195-205
• /
• 2001

The objective of the paper is to analyze the traffic characteristics for freeway merging area. Freeway merging area is different from basic section due to ramp vehicles. Therefore, to understand the traffic characteristics of (leeway merging area, this study focused on two factors including critical time headway required in merging maneuver and maximum possible merging volume. In this paper, new model that adopts critical time headway instead of critical time gap in calculating the maximum possible merging volume based on probability function was developed In previous studies, for calculating the maximum possible merging volume, it was considered that merging vehicles could merge freely if a given time gap was greater than the critical time gap. Also, the critical time gap was used as the same value in all traffic flow conditions. But, a time gap required in merging maneuver could be changed, even to the same driver, because difference of relative speed varies in different traffic flow conditions. So, in some cases, the critical time gap could be insufficient value in merging maneuver. Therefore, in this study. a calculating procedure for critical time headway in all traffic flow conditions was presented. Also, the maximum possible merging volume and capacity for freeway merging area were calculated by using the previously found critical time headway.