• Journal of Korean Society of Transportation
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.7-16
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• 2008

Severe congestion is happening at urban freeway off-ramps in Seoul. Major causes of congestion at off-ramps are a shortage of capacity and inefficient signal operations at the downstream intersection at off-ramps. It is necessary to control congestion by improving design or operations in the downstream intersection. In this study, the authors analyzed the case of the Jungdong interchange that was improved for design in the downstream intersection. When a freeway and an arterial road cross, diamond interchanges are usually selected with a single-point urban interchange (SPUI) as an alternative. To compare the effectiveness of a diamond interchange with a SPUI, the authors applied these two configurations to the Jungdong interchange using a simulation. The result of the analysis shows that congestion at off-ramps in diamond interchanges can be reduced by improving signal operations such as the application of "4 phase with overlaps" and that diamond interchanges are more efficient than a SPUI with a frontage road. Efficient operation of the downstream intersection by these findings can minimize congestion of not only the downstream intersection but also the freeway mainline.