Enhancing Driver Performance: A Closed Track Experiment

Signalized intersection operations are important for urban mobility, safety, travel times and environmental issues. Saturation flow rate and start-up lost time are two of the most important parameters when it comes to calculating signalized intersection capacity. Consequently, it is not surprising that countless studies have aimed towards estimating saturation flow rates and start up lost times at signalized intersections. Reports on saturation flow rates reveal large variations between different cities and countries. Values of 1800-2000 veh/h are common, but ranges from 1500-2500 veh/h have been observed. Driver performance is often regarded to be a result of the prevailing conditions, such as intersection geometry, grade, vehicle attributes, percentage of heavy vehicles and weather. Population characteristics, degree of familiar drivers (commuters) and traffic pressure are other factors that are reported to affect flow rates and lost times. As a result, most traffic management strategies are not aimed towards enhancing driver performance. This paper takes a different approach: How can we enhance driver performance, and more specifically; to what extent can behavior change increase signalized intersection capacity? The potential efficiency gains are studied by conducting a field trial on a closed track. Unlike other studies, this paper examines individual driver performance as well as overall traffic flow.