Knowledge Resources

This research evaluated the benefits of cooperative vehicle intersection control (CVIC) systems. A microscopic simulation model (VISSIM) was constructed to represent a hypothetical arterial consisting of four single-lane intersections spaced 400 meters apart. At each intersection an Intersection Control Agent (ICA) and an advanced algorithm were used to collect and analyze V2I data and recommend vehicle control actions to optimize network performance. The simulation included eight congestion scenarios ranging from low to high traffic volume conditions. Each scenario was analyzed to estimate network performance with and without the CVIC on a baseline network of coordinated actuated control at each intersection.

The authors discussed several important assumptions in the analysis including a market penetration rate that was set at 100 percent and the technical performance of wireless communications for connected vehicles which was assumed perfect.

FINDINGS

The following two surrogate safety measures were analyzed.

1) Time-to-collision (TTC) as a measure of time a vehicle would have before it collided with one another.

2) Post-encroachment-time (PET) as a measure of time required for a lead vehicle to leave a position and a following vehicle to occupy the position.

Although the TTC and the PET decreased which increased crash risk, the overall number of rear-end crash events for each case volume scenario analyzed decreased significantly.

• The CVIC system reduced the number of rear-end crash events by 30 to 87 percent indicating the system would result in safer driving conditions.