Studying perturbations and wave propagations by lane closures on traffic characteristics based on a dynamic approach

Danial Rezaei, Iman Aghayan and Farhad Hadadi

Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, 2021, vol. 566, issue C

Abstract: Lane closures cause perturbations and wave propagations on traffic characteristics of freeways and consequently affect traffic flow. To conduct a dynamic analysis regarding the effects of lane closures on traffic characteristics, this study aimed to examine the effects of lane closures as multi-static bottlenecks on the evolution and wave propagation of uniform traffic flow in a four-lane divided freeway based on the field study and macroscopic traffic flow model. One-lane closure is a work zone and two-lane closure occurs when the second lane near the one-lane closure is blocked due to an incident caused by a lane change. In addition, the classical Lighthill–Whitham–Richards (LWR) model was combined with the non-linear Greenshield’s speed–density relation to expand the models for characterizing the behavior of shockwaves under lane closures. Thus, based on numerical procedures regarding the Lax–Friedrichs scheme, the results indicated that wave propagations by two-lane closure have significant effects on the perturbations of traffic flow density which are 1.5 times as much as the wave propagations in one-lane closure. Moreover, one-lane closure reduced the capacity by 21% although the two-lane closure caused a 45% decrease in the capacity. A comparison between expanded LWRρ and LWRu models with the LWR model demonstrated that expanded models under two-lane closure and one-lane closure improved LWR model for the congested condition, and between uncongested and congested traffic condition 15.61% and 39%, respectively. Therefore, expanded models revealed a better performance as a dynamic approach to analyze the behavior of wave propagations in jam traffic conditions compared to LWR model under lane closures.

Keywords: Lane closures; Perturbations; Wave propagations; Dynamic analysis; Expanded models (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:phsmap:v:566:y:2021:i:c:s0378437120309523

DOI: 10.1016/j.physa.2020.125654

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