Road conflict simulation and its validation with experimental data

• Autor(a) principal: Gonçalves, Teresa Isabel Simões
• Data de Publicação: 2023
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10773/40720
• topic: Mobility; Road conflicts; Vulnerable road users; Simulation; Traffic control

Sustainable mobility is a topic that is increasingly being discussed around the world because of the new concern for the environment, CO₂ emissions, fuel costs and the health of all road users. Large cities are transforming their metropolitan centers into zones where there are traffic lanes for vehicles, bicycles and pedestrians, in which all means of transport can coexist without interference. This dissertation aims to understand and assess the road conflicts that exist between conventional vehicles and vulnerable users such as pedestrians and bicycles, using real data and simulation as a means to model and understand the conflicts. Alongside the Aveiro Tech City Living Lab, this study uses an existing infrastructure with sensing data that can be used to extend the monitoring of the city flows. After the monitoring of the data from vehicles and vulnerable road users, two simulation platforms are used, both of them used for modeling, one for road traffic and the other one for road conflicts, VISSIM and SSAM respectively, so that the simulated values are as close as possible to the values observed during monitoring. VISSIM is used to calibrate the observed results and the results taken from the simulation, which then returns them to SSAM, which cross-references the data, returning hypothetical road conflicts that could occur under the conditions presented. After all the information has been collected and the two pieces of software have been used, we can highlight the importance of the different traffic signals, particularly traffic lights, in controlling pedestrian and road traffic. The main results are based not only on the difference between the size, user behavior and braking capacity of the vehicle or VRUs, but also on the time of day simulated, as the factors surrounding the monitoring period differ, which significantly alters the number of conflicts and their conditions. Of the three conflicts observed, we can conclude that Crossing is the most relevant in VRU-Motor Vehicle conflicts, and the one of greatest concern for the case study.