Non-motorized vehicle characteristics and its effect on mixed traffic

Abstract

In countries like India we generally can find a mixed traffic i.e. a traffic flow constituting of all type of vehicles like cycle, rickshaw, car, bus etc. In Indian cities the share of non-motorized transport (NMT) at peak hours too high. Every public transport mode of transport involves access trips by NMT at each end. Thus, non-motorized mode of traffic plays a very important role in meeting travel demand in countries like India. To design a traffic facility it is necessary to understand the behavior of traffic stream. Understanding the behavior of a traffic stream with mixed traffic in quite complex. In this thesis an attempt to study the non-motorized vehicle characteristics and effect on mixed traffic is made.This project work is divided into two parts. First part is the experimental part and the latter is the analytical part. In experimental part a study of fundamental diagram of data obtained from various roads of Rourkela city. It was seen that with increase in NMV % the flow versus density graph is adversely affected. Density decreases at a particular flow rate when NMV % increases. Along with this a study on pattern of lateral occupancy of NMVs and MVs was done with respect to various percentages of NMV and total density. It was seen that as the percentage of NMV increases the both NMV and MV are well distributed all along the road stretch, with a higher concentration in the right hand side of the road, blocking the flow from the opposite direction. In India it is left hand side drive, so it may lead to side way collision while over taking. Also sometime this may end with a traffic jam condition. In the experimental part a study on variation of speed with respect to various parameters was done. It was seen that speed decreases with increase in number of PCUs in the same strip, speed decreases with increase in number of PCUs in the adjacent strips and speed increase when distance from the road edge increases. An attempt has been made to propose a model to simulate the speed of an NMV from the data obtained from experimental results. Fuzzy logic was used as a tool for linguistic classification of the premise variable in this model. As far as the simulation results are concerned it was seen that speed value obtained experimentally and obtained from the model are almost same. It was studied that all the three parameters have a significant impact on the speed of a non-motorized vehicle in a mixed traffic.Key words: NMV, MV, PCU, fuzzy logic, lateral occupancy, mixed traffic.