Impact of Traveler Information on Road Network Travel Time Reliability

To investigate the provision of traffic information on road network travel time reliability, the travelers are divided into two classes: travelers equipped with advanced traveler information systems (ATIS) and travelers unequipped with ATIS. A route choice behavior model considering information guidance is formulated as a mathematical program based on the mixed stochastic user equilibrium modeling approach in conjunction with the assumption is that two classes of travelers made their route choices in a Logit-based stochastic manner. The link capacities are treated as truncated normal random variables considering the fact that link capacity can only vary between 0 to link design capacity. With the above considerations, a travel time reliability evaluation method with degradable link capacity under influence of traveler information is proposed using the Monte Carlo simulation technique and network equilibrium flow solution algorithm. Some numerical studies on a small road network are conducted to validate the proposed method, the results show that: road network travel time reliability increases with the quality of information and/or the market penetration of ATIS, but the marginal effects of them are decreasing; for a road network with more higher traffic demand, the provision of traveler information can significantly improve road network travel time reliability.