Connected Vehicle Enabled Freeway Merge Management – Field Test

Final Report

Abstract

Working under a grant from the FHWA’s Exploratory Advanced Research Program, the University of Virginia Center for Transportation Studies (UVA CTS) has spent two years developing and simulation testing a set of advanced algorithms to improve freeway merging using connected vehicle technology. The objective of the algorithms is to increase utilization of merging capacity in freeways, and also to reduce merging related incidents. All of the algorithms have been evaluated and refined in an enhanced simulation environment considering different market penetration rates of the connected vehicle technology with diverse freeway traffic scenarios. In addition, one of the key innovations of this project was that it full incorporated a wireless communication emulation in the simulation environment. This resulted in a truly interactive simulation environment that enabled dynamic coupling between the traffic simulator and the network simulator. The specific algorithms proposed for field testing at the UTC Virginia test beds are: Variable Speed Limit (VSL), Lane Changing Advisory (LCA), and Merging Control Algorithms (MCA). The UTC Virginia test beds present an excellent opportunity to follow-up on the work sponsored by the EARP program to validate the benefits of the developed algorithms. This will provide the advantages of accelerating implementation of this mobility application, and also helping to refine UVA CTS’s connected vehicle simulation environment for use on other algorithm development efforts.

Highlights

Based on the compliance data, it is evident that the highest compliance rates are achieved for large and medium gap size scenarios, with no significant difference of compliance rates between these gap sizes.
Though the small gap scenario has resulted in the lowest compliance rates (58%), it implies that some drivers were comfortable following advisories when available gaps were relatively smaller and accept gaps that they would have otherwise rejected. This indicates that the Merge Management Advisories have the potential to improve merging operation even in highly congested condition.
A valuable lesson from this study is that it is important to design advisory messages in straightforward way so that drivers can readily understand and with which the desired outcomes are easily achieved.
In most cases, no significant differences in compliance rates between male and female participants were found.
Older participant drivers (65 years and above) demonstrated statistically significant lower compliance rate when compared with all other age groups.
In terms of response time, for both MCA and LCA strategy, we can observe similar trend in the average reaction times across the different gap sizes with comparatively slower response for VSL advisory. Also, as gap size decreased, the average reaction time also increased, this may be due to drivers becoming more cautious about lane changing as the available gap size decreased.

Publications

Hayat, M.T., Park, H., & Smith, B.L. (2016). Investigating Drivers’ Response Time to Freeway Merge Management Advisory Messages in a Connected Vehicle Environment. Accepted for publication in the Transportation Research Record Journal: Transportation Research Board. Washington, D.C.

Hayat, M.T., Park, H., & Smith, B.L. (2016, January). Investigating Drivers’ Response Time to Freeway Merge Management Advisory Messages in a Connected Vehicle Environment. Published within the proceedings of the 95th Annual Meeting of the Transportation Research Board. Washington, D.C.

Hayat, M.T., Park, H., & Smith, B.L. (2015, January). Investigating Drivers’ Response to Merge Management Advisory Messages in Connected Vehicle Environment. Published within the proceedings of the 94th Annual Meeting of the Transportation Research Board. Washington, D.C.

Hayat, M.T., Park, H., & Smith, B.L. (2014, June). Connected Vehicle Enabled Freeway Merge Assistance System Field Test: Preliminary Results of Driver Compliance to Advisory. Published within the proceedings of the 2014 IEEE Intelligent Vehicles Symposium (IV’14). Dearborn, Michigan, USA.

Presentations

Hayat, M.T., Park, H., & Smith, B.L. (2016, January). Investigating Drivers’ Response Time to Freeway Merge Management Advisory Messages in a Connected Vehicle Environment. Presented at the 95th Annual Meeting of the Transportation Research Board. Washington, D.C.

Hayat, M.T., Park, H., & Smith, B.L. (2015, January). Investigating Drivers’ Response to Merge Management Advisory Messages in Connected Vehicle Environment. Presented at the 94th Annual Meeting of the Transportation Research Board. Washington, D.C.

Hayat, M.T., Park, H., & Smith, B.L. (2014). Development of an Advisory Response Model for A Connected Vehicle Enabled Freeway Merge Assistance System: Interim Status. Presented at the 21st ITS World Congress. Detroit, MI.

Hayat, M.T., Park, H., & Smith, B.L. (2014, June). Connected Vehicle Enabled Freeway Merge Assistance System Field Test: Preliminary Results of Driver Compliance to Advisory. Presented at the 2014 IEEE Intelligent Vehicles Symposium (IV’14). Dearborn, Michigan, USA.

Project Information

Start date: 2012/9/3
End date: 2013/9/2
Status: Active
Contract/Grant Number: 0031370150000
Secondary Number: 54-6001805
Total Dollars: $150,018
Source Organization: Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg
Date Added: 08/20/2012

Sponsor Organization

Research and Innovative Technology Administration
University Transportation Centers Program
Department of Transportation
1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
Washington, DC 20590
USA

UTC Grant Manager

Harwood, Leslie
Phone: 540-231-9530
Email: lharwood@vtti.vt.edu

Performing Organization

University of Virginia, Charlottesville
Center for Transportation Studies
P.O. Box 400742, Thornton Hall, D228
Charlottesville, VA 22903
USA

Research Investigators

Smith, Brian
Park, Hyungjun
Hayat, Tanveer

Subjects

Highways
Operations and Traffic Management
Safety and Human Factors
Vehicles and Equipment
Transportation (General)

More Information

RiP URL
Project Poster
TriD Format