The impacts of connected vehicle technology on network-wide traffic operation and fuel consumption under various incident scenarios

ABSTRACT

Incidents are a major source of traffic congestion and can lead to long and unpredictable delays, deteriorating traffic operations and adverse environmental impacts. The emergence of connected vehicles and communication technologies has enabled travelers to use real-time traffic information. The ability to exchange traffic information among vehicles has tremendous potential impacts on network performance especially in the case of non-recurrent congestion. To this end, this paper utilizes a microscopic simulation model of traffic in El Paso, Texas to investigate the impacts of incidents on traffic operation and fuel consumption at different market penetration rates (MPR) of connected vehicles. Several scenarios are implemented and tested to determine the impacts of incidents on network performance in an urban area. The scenarios are defined by changing the duration of incidents and the number of lanes closed. This study also shows how communication technology affects network performance in response to congestion. The results of the study demonstrate the potential effectiveness of connected vehicle technology in improving network performance. For an incident with a duration of 900 s and MPR of 80%, total fuel consumption and total travel time decreased by approximately 20%; 26% was observed in network-wide travel time and fuel consumption at 100% MPR.

KEYWORDS:

• Connected vehicles
• traffic operation
• fuel consumption
• traffic incidents
• microscopic simulation
• simulation of urban mobility (SUMO)
• case study

Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful the Hagler Institute for Advanced Studies at Texas A&M University for supporting this study. The authors also would like to thank the High Performance Research Computing for dedicating resources for our simulation. We also would like to thank Texas A&M Transportation Institute and Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) for providing the data for the network of El Paso, Texas. Author contributions: A. Samimi Abianeh, M. Burris, A. Talebpour and K. Sinha conceived and designed the experiments; A. Samimi Abianeh performed the experiments; A. Samimi Abianeh analyzed the data; M. Burris, A. Talebpour and K. Sinha. contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools; A. Samimi Abianeh, M. Burris, A. Talebpour and K. Sinha wrote the paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

ORCID

Arezoo Samimi Abianeh http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5811-9392

Mark Burris http://orcid.org/0000-0003-4216-708X

Alireza Talebpour http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5412-5592

Kumares Sinha http://orcid.org/0000-0002-6876-4782