REAL TRANSPORTATION SOLUTIONS

TRANSCAD Highlights: Transportation Master Plan

2011-09-15T15:04:00.000-07:00

PRISM Engineering was hired by the City of Los Banos to create a sophisticated peak hour traffic model for the City using the TRANSCAD software, Synchro Pro and Sim Traffic for analysis and microsimulation to model traffic flows at intersections. The purpose of this work effort was to provide the level of detail necessary to properly analyze intersection turning movements and street segment traffic operations. This work effort built on the same data used in the current general plan update. The intersection levels of service were calculated for significant intersections (collectors and arterials) throughout the City, and where level of service C conditions were exceeded, mitigations were developed which generally included signalizing an intersection or widening of a roadway or intersection approach. Cost estimates were prepared for each mitigation and a resulting mitigation fee was developed.

Ever heard of an 11 day Traffic Jam? China has them. 0.5 MPH

2010-08-25T08:15:00.000-07:00

Trucks can be seen on a highway in Wanquan County in north China's Hebei Province on Aug. 23. The traffic jam has stretched as long as 60 miles in northern China, continues into its eleventh day.

Half a mile, per hour, average, for a 60 mile stretch, the ONLY WAY through. Drivers are reporting being stuck in this jam for FIVE DAYS. Thousands of trucks are packed nose to tail for more than 60 miles in a 10-day traffic jam northwest of Beijing.
The jam has seen thousands of vehicles backed up along a 60-mile-long stretch of road between Inner Mongolia and Beijing. Motorists have reported travel times of up to five days to get through the king-sized snarl.

The immediate cause of the jam is road construction on National Expressway 110 (G110). But those repairs were needed due to damage from a recent surge in jumbo truck traffic carrying coal and some agricultural products, the Global Times reported.

There is another route from northwest China to Beijing, but it's open only to trucks 4 tons or lighter and charges costly tolls that transporters prefer to dodge, the Times reported.

How do you handle a FIVE DAY "layover" on a stretch of freeway? How do you eat, drink, sleep, and, find relief? This is so unacceptable as to boggle the mind, the kinds of growth problems China is experiencing. It requires better and more realistic PLANNING. All of these things could be avoided if rules and regulations were enforced, and bribes did not play a role in looking the other way.

Truckers are "camping out." Playing games in the shade of a truck. Bathing right on the streets, and everything else? As bad as traffic can be in the United States, our problems are dwarfed by conditions such as this. Proper planning is KEY to avoiding conditions of DELAY to motorists and degradation of air quality and quality of life. I am grateful that the United States has a fairly uniform goal within cities and counties where governments strive to properly plan municipalities for adequate utilities, adequate transportation and movement of people, and land use compatibility for beautiful communities. Still, we have a ways to go because it is far from perfect, and people complain, but compared to China..., well.
source: AP, CSM, AOL

TRANSPORTATION MASTER PLAN, Los Banos, CA (approved by City Council 5/5/2010)

2010-05-06T14:41:00.000-07:00

Dwayne Chisam the Public Works Director said:

"In all my 25 years of municipal government experience I have never had a program that was more universally accepted. Prism was a pleasure to work with, and the finished product positioned the City to proactively address their transportation issues rather than react as was the case for many years."

PRISM Engineering was hired by the City of Los Banos to create a sophisticated peak hour traffic model for the City. The purpose of this work effort was to provide the level of detail necessary to properly analyze intersection turning movements and street segment traffic operations. This work effort built on the same data used in the current general plan update. The intersection levels of service were calculated for significant intersections (collectors and arterials) throughout the City, and where level of service C conditions were exceeded, mitigations were developed which generally included signalizing an intersection or widening of a roadway or intersection approach. Cost estimates were prepared for each mitigation and a resulting mitigation fee was developed.

TRAFFIC MODEL DEVELOPMENT
The traffic model was created using the TransCAD software program, a traffic modeling and land use data base tool used by the majority of cities and counties throughout the United States. The software provides a visual interface into Parcel Data base information as well as output from the model. The model was created using the county’s graphical information system (GIS) data set as a starting point, and PRISM Engineering subdivided all traffic analysis zones, and added additional streets and intersection information as needed to properly represent the existing condition of the
City’s transportation system. PRISM Engineering utilized video technology to document commercial land uses throughout the City so that highly accurate pm peak hour trip generation calculations would take place in the traffic model. Newer and smaller traffic analysis zones were created at the block level throughout the City, and each parcel within the GIS was assigned a specific land use category for trip generation purposes. The Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE) Trip Generation Manual was consulted to provide the best trip generation information available for each parcel in the City. The result of this level of detail was to assign realistic trip generation numbers for the pm peak hour to the street system surrounding each block since trip generation was calculated for each block.

TRAFFIC STUDY RESULTS

The traffic model was a detailed pm peak hour traffic model based on pm peak hour ITE Trip Generation rates, with an am and a daily forecast capability. The result of this detailed forecast tool was a report with detailed intersection improvements illustrated for over 55 locations throughout the City of Los Banos, and recommendations for street segment improvements related to intersection improvements. The cost estimates were prepared by the City and used to update the City's transportation mitigation fee program.

The traffic model and report were adopted by City Council on May 5, 2010. Total cost for traffic model development and traffic operations analysis in this study from 2007-2010: $240k.

BAY BRIDGE 360

2009-10-28T11:36:00.001-07:00

This website is just awesome.

Click here to go to it.

It shows with video and photos the progress and plans for the bridge improvements. Very well done.

Bay Bridge Shut Down

2009-10-28T10:15:00.000-07:00

The San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge closed indefinitely Tuesday night after a piece of the span fell onto the roadway, prompting the thousands who use the bridge to hunt for alternative routes. The 73-year-old bridge spans the San Francisco Bay and carries an average of 280,000 vehicles daily, the state's Transportation Department says.
(CNN Difficult rush hour expected after Bay Bridge closes)

S.F. Bay Bridge Shut Down After Rod Collapse
What a traffic mess.

What a nightmare.

All these hundreds of thousands of people each day having to figure out another way to cross the bay. How did our transportation system ever become so dependent on such fatal flaws? How are the BART parking lots going to handle hundreds of thousands of more cars to park when they are already at capacity? How are the other bridges going to handle the HUGE influx of traffic assuming that people take their cars still? How can BART handle any "signficant" increase in traffic compared to the displacement by adding a few more trains for service?

This problem is just not solvable in the short term, and even in the long term it is questionable. Just look at how much traffic is on the bridge today (see left). Where did all those 200,000+ cars go?? There needs to be a paradigm shift in how work gets done. Telecommute? Find new jobs? This bottleneck traffic idea, where cars must cross a body of water EVERY DAY is precarious. It is shut down when an earthquake damages the structures, and earthquakes are not uncommon in the Bay Area. To me, it just seems like a bad idea for people to get themselves dependent on crossing a bridge every day. People make this choice. They choose to work on one side of the bay, but then choose to live on the other side of the bay... and there is only ONE practical way to get to work. Its a gamble.

A good transportation plan anticipates the travel patterns of all people in a region, and figures out a fail-safe way for alternative paths of travel, in case there is an emergency, for instance. The Bay Bridge, Golden Gate Bridge, etc. all those bridges over there are a marvel of engineering, but the transportation plan is severely lacking. The Bay Area intercity transportation system is too dependent on single paths of travel that are far apart from each other, where when one shuts down, the only alternative is four or five more hours of travel time to an "adjacent" path. Unacceptable!

To the credit of structural engineers, they are planning on constructing a replacement bridge that will handle seismic activity in very creative ways. Ingenious innovation that can only be appreciated by watching the video to the left. This video is from BAYBRIDGEINFO.ORG

Grant's simplified solution: The cities are already built out with land use plans in place that are not sustainable when transportation links fail such as this. There is no simple solution. Just a lesson to be learned. Housing needs to be closer to jobs, and businesses should not locate where housing is prohibitive, but they do... they want that big skyscraper.

Transportation for the Totally Green: A Bike That Can Haul Buns!

2009-05-26T15:13:00.000-07:00

Now here's a bike that can haul buns! Literally. Built to carry a load, even cargo, this bike keeps it at a low center of gravity and allows you to pile on.

I saw an article about a young man who thought about delivering pizza in a novel way: by riding a bike and hauling the load. Not just any bike.
"Anything you do every day with your car you can use a bike for," Jamnik said. "And it's two-fold; you're helping the environment, and it's a great way to be healthy and stay in shape at the same time."

He got the idea two years ago while studying abroad in China. There, he saw people using bikes to cart just about everything, from furniture to dumpling stands. Later, Jamnik learned about a company called Xtracycle that makes attachments to convert bicycles into utility bikes.

see Pizza's Here - By Bicycle Delivery

Practical Slideshow from Xtracycle on Vimeo.

Now There's a Good Idea: Cars Americans Want, and Good for the Environment.

2009-05-22T15:27:00.000-07:00

Our family already owns a Totota PRIUS so we are plugged in to driving green (and saving all that money at the pump!). The car gets about 40 mpg which isn't bad (less than advertised), but again, we live in the hills and the PRIUS is designed to work for stop and go city driving where it gets the maximum benefit of braking. Yes, braking is good for a Prius. Braking is what charges the batteries in a hybrid. Rather than wear out brake shoes to stop a car, the hybrid car has a braking system converts that kinetic energy into potential energy by turning electric motors in reverse to generate a charge for the batteries...kind of like an alternator on steroids but attached to the front wheels.

I saw the big SUV car in this video, and think of how much better it will operate than the Prius we own. First of all, its BIG! Its comfortable for a big guy like me (can't really stand the cramped quarters of the Prius, but my kids don't mind). This big car plugs in and gets a full electric charge that can run primarily without gas (up to 120 mpg for the first 30 miles after a charge). Our Prius on the other hand, starts its motor right away after only a few seconds, starts and stops it, starts and stops it, the whole time you drive, that motor starts and stops to charge the batteries. You don't notice it much, but that motor works. Sometimes when the battery level is low like when driving up a hill, the gas motor runs at full bore to fully supplement the electrical motor which has completely shut down (until you do some more braking).

BTW, don't ever run out of gas with one of these things.

This IS the Future of "Gas" Stations

2009-05-16T17:03:00.000-07:00

Tech visionary Shai Agassi thinks he's got a solution - and sees zero-emission cars hitting Main Streets in just two years.

How will you leave the world a better place than you found it? When Shai Agassi was challenged for an answer, he responded with swift action: he resigned from the business-software firm SAP, declining an offer to be CEO, and set out to help the world end its addiction to oil by transforming cars from their climate-changing, lung-polluting, gas-guzzling design to one that's clean, affordable and all-electric. The name for his new enterprise was obvious — Better Place.

O.K., so you've heard of a million such plans before — but none are like Agassi's. Yes, he wants to replace gas-powered cars with electric ones, but he also wants to build an infrastructure in which gas stations are replaced by battery exchanges and charging stations and are everywhere. When you start running out of juice, you just plug in or swap out, and off you go. It's as easy as stopping for gas.

Source: Time Magazine 2009 100 list

The idea is to make the capital investment in a new electric car similar to the business model of the cell phone. Cell phones are cheap to get in to, but require a service plan, and the phone companies are making money by selling minutes in various plans. This Electric Vehicle business plan aims to sell miles traveled in the form of a charged battery. Batteries can also be charged at home or work, whatever is more convenient when you park. On longer distance trips there is the swap station infrastructure. Its already a go in Israel. This is not a concept. http://www.betterplace.com/

Grant's simplified solution: Phase out the gas, and in with the Grid and clean nuclear power to charge it up.

TrackBack Link: http://prismengineering.blogspot.com/2009/05/this-is-future-of-gas-stations.html

Car Pool Lanes: Are They Working?

2009-05-16T15:32:00.000-07:00

Officials eye weekend carpool lanes on I-80

We've tried a lot of experiments in traffic engineering and transportation planning to try and change driving behavior and choices. But I think where we have failed the most is in targeting what people really need, what people really want, and as government, satisfying that. Many "social engineers" have thought of and implemented methods to try and change the behavior of people, to get them out of their cars to ride the trains, the buses, and to hitch a ride, to slow down, etc. But what if that behavior is not behavior at all, but a mere logical choice in getting around, a monetary decision, or just getting things done? Clearly the honor system of doing what is best for the environment first is NOT working. Clearly that's not first and foremost in the minds of most drivers. Forced car pool lanes don't appear to have solved the problem either, and we have the environmentally unfriendly congestion to prove that.
from the article:

Westbound Interstate 80 has earned its place in the commuter hall of shame. Year after year it ranks as the Bay Area's worst commute, and it's placed high on national lousy commute lists as well.
"There is so much traffic on the I-80 corridor, even Saturdays and Sundays," said Bill Dodd, a Napa County supervisor and member of the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, "but we are not rewarding people for doing the right thing."
But carpool lanes have their critics, who complain that because tax revenue is used to build the freeways, all lanes should be open to all drivers - not just those carrying a certain number of passengers or driving a hybrid.

It doesn't appear that the car pool lanes in the photo are offering any faster ride (still seeing brake lights and similar spacing based on speed). It doesn't appear that these well-behaved drivers are getting any appreciable time savings to make up for the time they all took to plan and coordinate the ride, wait for the ride, etc., and all the sacrifices that go along with it. Indeed that's what this San Francisco Chronicle news story is all about. The debate of where we stand.

Car pool lanes are a form of social engineering that started decades ago, and as traffic grows and we do not add additional lanes to the freeways, even with car pool lanes, we are going to have stop and go traffic. Carbon emissions aside, this is a capacity issue, and even if all of the cars were electric it would operate the same. We are not adequately addressing the capacity side of the equation, instead freeway planning has been procrastinating the inevitable: that capacity will be exceeded. Now that it is exceeded in many places, what is the solution? More car pool lanes? I don't think so, and here's why.

Car pool lanes work for those that have the ability to take advantage of them. Like these people in the photo to the left, waiting for their ride to get there. It all depends on where you work, doesn't it, and the timing of the trip depends on when others need to arrive to their work place. I know, I know, its all workable, but in the real world there are complications like taking your kids to school, making that efficient chained trip to the store to pick up that grocery (you can't go shopping if you are in a car pool), like being retired and not having to make a work commute but you still need to use the freeway. Would a car pool lane work for you? Many people are helping the environment by minimizing the number of times you take your vehicle out on the road, and to cover/plan as many combined trips as possible: trips to several stores, meetings, and other locations such as activities for kids and school, etc. How can you car pool that? It's not always possible. Suburbia makes it harder to coordinate carpools. Carpooling often compromises flexibility. What if you need to stay at work late or need to pick up a sick child from school? What car are you going to use?

Car pool lanes do save money in that your local State DOT doesn't have to spend any money to add capacity (more lanes) for that peak commute hour, but car pool lanes don't necessarily help the environment much because once those people who car pooled get home, they most likely will have to take the car out for another spin to get some errands done, an errand that can not be done in the car pool. There still will be numerous errands to run not related to traveling to an office.

Grant's simplified solution: Use our tax dollars and build the roads we need. Build on the trip-chaining model to optimize land use development. Most people want/need to drive.

BackTrack Link to the post: http://prismengineering.blogspot.com/2009/05/car-pool-lanes.html

National Bike To Work Day: We Have a Ways To Go for this to be SAFE for everybody

2009-05-15T14:32:00.000-07:00

Get on your bike, ride; Friday is Bike to Work Day!

Friday is Bike to Work Day, but the fact is, even in a proudly green city like Seattle, only 2.3 percent of adult workers use a bicycle to commute to work, compared with the 65 percent who drive and the 18 percent who take the bus.

When I went to college in 1981, for several years I rode my 10 speed a few miles along the surface streets of Sacramento suburbs in Fair Oaks to connect the American River Bike Trail at the Sunrise bridge, and had a 16 mile one-way commute (32 miles round trip) to CSUS college. What a great set-up! I stayed in great shape! But there was a price. Those hot summer days. The one hour trip if I peddled nearly as fast as I could at 15-20 mph. That's a workout to keep that up for an hour! You arrive all sweaty. You arrive all tired. I actually remember putting my head down to sleep during class from time to time just to recuperate.

The trips home in the dark. I actually had a head-on collision on the bike trail one night because my light was not functioning, and the other cyclist didn't have a light so I never saw it coming. SLAM! We both laid on the ground, couldn't even see each other, groaning in pain. Eventually we moved on, never speaking. It was strange.

In order for this to work, I believe we have a long way to go, and the main reason that I will not ride my bike to work along busy streets shared with traffic is because of safety. Safety matters. While riding to work in my early career, I recall using the bike lanes on major boulevards, not dissimilar to the photo shown at the top of this post. The problem is, I am going 10 mph, and the traffic is going 45 mph, minimum. When a large truck that just dropped off its groceries to the local supermarket comes zooming past you at 45 mph, you nervously and tensely observe a huge 80' long semi-truck zing past on your left side only a couple of feet away. The ROAR of it. The huge gust of wind that follows once it gets past, that SUCKS you into the travel way. It's unnerving. And you don't want to experience it again. Cars at very high speeds can also cause this near-death experience.

Biking in these "Class II" bike lanes (where there is a 4' or 6' striped lane for bikes along side the 12' one for vehicles) can be dangerous for your health. Near-death experiences can occur. The transition area, the little 4" stripe that separates the slow moving bikes from the fast moving vehicles and trucks, offers absolutely no protection for a car or bike going just a little astray from the intended path. If one enters into the other, there is going to be a very unpleasant collision and the cyclist is going to the hospital or worse. The problem is the differential of speed. It's a 35 mph differential of speed, minimum. And that means the cyclist will experience a 35 mph unprotected collision of flesh and bone against metal.

Even when professional cyclists have the whole road to themselves, one slight mistake of even one cyclist can spell disaster for the rest. There's not a lot of room to maneuver when you are elbow to elbow and everyone is tailgating. No one is thinking about safety in this race, excepting the helmuts.

We don't design pedestrian walk ways next to the high speed travel lane of a busy boulevard. Sidewalks are implemented behind guard rails, or telephone poles and signal standards offering some protection. We often have on-street parking that separates the sidewalks from the traveled way, with the parked vehicles acting as a guard rail of sorts offering additional protection. If nothing else, there is a curb that does a better job at defining the barrier versus a stripe.

But with the bike lane and the vehicle lane? No protection at all. Just a stripe. Until we truly address the safety issues that do exist with the differential of speeds between cyclists and vehicles, I can't recommend that they share the road. I don't think that is a good idea, because I've lived it. Some Bicycle Safety Statistics:

there may be on the order of one million medically-attended injuries involving bicycles every year. In addition, there are as many as 1,000 bicycle-related fatalities annually. The estimated costs of these injuries and deaths to society are high -- approximately $8 billion annually.

Most bicyclists (64 percent) ride a substantial proportion of the time on neighborhood streets with low traffic volume, but sizable proportions also spend a lot of their riding time on sidewalks and playgrounds (29 percent), bike paths (17 percent), and unpaved roads (18 percent); smaller proportions ride on major thoroughfares with high traffic volume (7 percent) and on other unpaved surfaces or trails (11 percent).

Source: http://www.cpsc.gov/cpscpub/pubs/344.pdf

Grant's simplified solution: Build only safe and separate bike facilities. Plan communities with bike and pedestrian/jogging, etc. facilities.

BackTrack Link to this post: http://prismengineering.blogspot.com/2009/05/national-bike-to-work-day-we-have-long.html

Traffic Calming Tragedy at "Traffic Circle"

2009-05-14T20:58:00.000-07:00

Man gets 11 years for roundabout killing
Maybe the people in the neighborhood felt that with a roundabout in place, that everybody would calm down. So a man decides to take care of the plants in his neighborhood roundabout by watering them, and doing some gardening. No problem here, that's all wonderful and responsible, but he decided to try and control traffic at the same time and put up orange cones to divert traffic away from running over his garden hose. And the few extra seconds of delay caused some drivers to get angry about it. Can you believe the impatience?

What is it about people being delayed that can bring out the worst anger management problems? So it happened this time.

MURDER SCENE IN SEATTLE, WA at MINI ROUNDABOUT

Paroline, a Vietnam veteran, ran into trouble last July 9 while watering plants in the roundabout at South Cooper Street and 61st Avenue South. He had set up cones to keep cars from driving over his hose while he watered, and his cones were causing traffic to back up.

Three young women in a car near the intersection confronted Paroline and demanded that he move the cones. When he refused, one of the girls got out of the car and began moving the cones herself.

So a friend of these girls comes back to punch the lights out of this 60 year old man just doing a little gardening. He killed the man with that punch.
If there's something to be learned from this, its that no matter what we do with road traffic control, whether it be signals, stop signs, or roundabouts and traffic calming, it is wise to know and realize that there will always be angry people on the roadways who will not be delayed, and they will resort to dangerous acts. Part of traffic calming has got to be driving calmly, pulling over when people want to get around, not putting up cones in the street or driving extra slow to slow the angry people down. It just isn't worth the risk. People might pull out a gun. We need to think about that. If we want to personally correct bad behavior, don't. Let the police handle it.

Grant's simplified solution: Let the police police drivers. Concerned neighborhoods can work together to install traffic calming, and/or pay for additional real law enforcement as an alternative to enforce speed control, etc.

BackTrack Link to this post: http://prismengineering.blogspot.com/2009/05/traffic-calming-tragedy-at-roundabout.html

SPEEDING: The Boy Racers Have Already Knocked A Wall Down Twice

2009-05-13T16:19:00.000-07:00

Would-be MP calls for action on speeding

“The boy racers have already knocked a wall down twice where the speed they have travelled around the roundabout was far too fast.

Being honest, I was, at 16, the kind of driver that would race around one of these. It's probably the ultimate challenge of the reverse curves, the U-turn, the going in circles.
From the article:

Many [residents] feel it is a dangerous [road]...[that] traffic calming measures needed to be considered carefully. [Residents] said: “Rumble strips and speed humps are too noisy. “We already have humps in Exbourne Road which have been modified but still keep everyone awake at night. “We all believe that every residential road should be 20mph.

HOW to achieve this is the problem. The rumble strips and speed bumps are too noisy. The speed humps keep them awake at night. This is a classic case of wanting cake and eat it too. People want a solution. Four out of every five residents surveyed said they would like to see traffic calming measures including rough road surfaces and chicanes. Rough roads are noisy too, and with the collective cost of beating up a car's suspension and alignment, etc., a neighborhood could instead spend that money and hire a personal neighborhood cop to stand guard and nab those speeders.
A chicane is a forced obstruction in the road as shown in this photo, that essentially brings the road down to a one lane road (see the ONE LANE ROAD warning sign?), and if cars going opposite directions meet, one of the cars has to decide that they will wait it out. How does the moving van get in there??
My personal opinion? These look like such a make-shift hodgepodge on a road, like they don't belong there. There is a bigger question at stake here. Can we mix vehicles and residential living? Teenagers and adults in a hurry will always be with us. Safety will always be a need of great and utmost importance. Then why are not roads serving residential areas being designed IN ADVANCE to keep traffic safer? Is it even possible? The speeder will go around a chicane at high speeds and create a danger in doing that. Have we gained anything if the non-conforming driver will run over sidewalks, lawns, and curbs to get there faster? Can we stop that?
Most people drive reasonably. Traffic calming is therefore a kind of gimmick to try and force the non-conformer to conform to safe speeds, or speeds that local neighbors think is safe. We have to ask ourselves, is this working? Based on this article from the UK and many others, we see that we still have speeders and few solutions short of a policeman standing guard.

One more anecdotal story. Many drivers sped over a double speed hump traffic calming device installed on a long residential neighborhood street in Sacramento. These drivers discovered that if you went fast enough, the bump to the vehicle was minimal, just a blip blip. The neighbors were furious about it, and felt they had to do something. Their solution? Pick up handfuls of gravel and throw rocks at windshield of any car that sped over the speed humps. Fighting unsafe driving with unsafe measures. That's how emotional this can get.

Grant's simplified solution: 1) Everybody calm down. Including concerned neighbors. Our traffic system is an exercise in compromise. 2) Design safer neighborhood road systems that actually separate vehicles from bikes and pedestrians / children. It doesn't exist yet.

BackTrack Link for this post: http://prismengineering.blogspot.com/2009/05/boy-racers-have-already-knocked-wall.html

This Is Cool: A Traffic Simulator For Engineering Students

2009-05-13T07:43:00.000-07:00

Pilots have flight simulators to learn how to fly an aircraft. Now engineering students at Florida International University have a traffic simulator to learn how to manage traffic on South Florida's congested highways.
The new $150,000 Integrated Intelligent Transportation System Laboratory

This new lab is a miniature of the $9,200,000 Sunguide Transportation Management Center used by the Florida DOT to monitor traffic, dispatch help, etc.

Students pursuing transportation careers will be able to use the traffic research lab to model traffic management techniques and develop projects aimed at solving congestion issues.

Freeway traffic is among the most unpredictable and potentially frustrating driving experience available. One driver slamming their brakes can send a shock wave of braking back for miles, and although it only took a few seconds to bring the lane of traffic to its knees, it can be a long long time before that lane of traffic gets back up to speed. Welcome to the rush hour stop and go scenario. I think freeway traffic absolutely needs the interactive intelligence of traffic engineers watching the live traffic flow video feeds and data graphs, so that they can develop real time solutions to help prevent negative results like stop and go traffic. I for one am glad to see research and development dollars dedicated to improving this deficiency in our transportation system. As traffic engineers develop more intelligence in the freeway system traffic flow models and methods, drivers will get the bigger picture and be able to make better more informed choices. Choices like:
1) alternative routes when accidents or congestion occurs
2) suggested speeds to maximize flow and capacity,

and giving law enforcement additional tools to monitor traffic, and possibly issue a ticket to violators of basic traffic laws. Why not have a CHP watch traffic from a set of cameras and nab those worst of the worst, the ones who always get away with disruption of traffic flows...? Zoom in on a license plate and send them a ticket by mail. Now I don't like a police state any more than the other guy, even less, but how many times have we said to ourselves, "where's the CHP when you need them?"

BackTrack Link for this post: http://prismengineering.blogspot.com/2009/05/this-is-cool-traffic-simulator-for.html

When Traffic Calming Just SHIFTS The Traffic Around

2009-05-12T14:15:00.001-07:00

Debate reopens over Rivercrest street closures

The partial closure, erected in May 2008 as a way to minimize the number of drivers cutting through the Rivercrest subdivision to reach the Sam Houston Tollway, has pitted the interests of two vocal, politically connected neighborhoods against each another.

Adjacent neighborhoods in Houston Texas who share the streets are at contentious odds with one another, because one neighborhood, the Rivercrest, got traffic patterns changed to favor their streets: no one can drive INTO them from the main street, including THEM. So the Rivercrest residents and guests have to drive through the Briargrove Park neighborhood to go home.

That doesn't seem fair or equitable to me, to just shift the "problem" to another neighborhood. It's traffic calming measures like this one that can tend to give traffic calming an undeserved bad name. When a neighborhood has interconnecting roads, all neighbors depend equally on those roads for simple and equal access to their homes. When travel patterns in neighborhoods are changed, impacts can happen elsewhere and all of that needs to be considered. I wondered at the seeming inequity. So I looked into it.

BRIARPARK NEIGHBORHOOD

RIVERCREST NEIGHBORHOOD

I did a google map search of this neighborhood and couldn't help but notice from the aerial photos, the great disparity between home values and property sizes of those who reaped the benefit. When one considers the 20,000 square foot mansions in the Rivercrest neighborhood where the closures took place as requested, with the more humble 2,000 square foot offerings next door in Briarpark, it paints a picture. Twenty-five homes in Briarpark sit on the same amount of land as one of the Rivercrest residents. That means that the Rivercrest residents ALREADY had 25 times less traffic than Briarpark, which begs the question. Why is there a problem? Then I read it:

The city decided on the one-way closure after it lost a lawsuit brought by Rivercrest

So Rivercrest could afford the lawyers, and presumably only wanted invited guests to use "their" streets. That is not traffic calming, to shift one neighborhood's impacts to another neighborhood's streets that already has enough traffic of its own (even 25 times more). The reason given (see above) is that there is "cut through" traffic in Rivercrest to get to the toll road (W Beltway 8). That does not make sense as the distance traveled on surface streets is longer (and slower). There is a much more direct route for traffic to just travel along Westheimer Road west to the frontage road turn right and get on the on-ramp to the freeway much sooner (skip the Rivercrest cut-through idea). It would take much longer to go through a neighborhood than to travel along the uninterrupted roadways to the on-ramp.

To the City's credit they are reconsidering this decision. They should conduct a license plate survey to ascertain how many (if any) vehicles turn north onto Rivercrest Street from Westheimer actually end up at the toll road frontage road on ramp, once they remove those barricades.

Grant's simplified solution: Cities should never shift traffic patterns around at the expense of one neighborhood while benefiting another.

BackTrack Link for this post: http://prismengineering.blogspot.com/2009/05/when-traffic-calming-just-shifts.html

School Bus Smash Up. How Does This Happen?

2009-05-12T12:16:00.000-07:00

School bus involved in multi-vehicle accident

At least eight people were injured in an accident Tuesday morning in Pikesville involving eight vehicles, including a school bus headed to Pikesville Middle School, according to Baltimore County authorities...
Six of the cars were waiting in the turn lane on southbound Park Heights Avenue to turn left onto Brooks Robinson Drive when they were struck by the bus in a chain reaction, the spokeswoman said.

Driving too close (tailgating) is so common today as to make you the odd man out if you are not doing it. On a freeway especially while traveling in the fast lane, if you place enough distance between your vehicle and the one in front of you to be safe (2 second headway minimum), it is guaranteed that someone will come around you in the right lane and jam right in front of you, then the next, then the next. It never ends! Those people (half of drivers?) are used to 1/2 second or less headway (tailgaters) and they use the tailgate technique to "press" traffic even faster. Flashing brights is another supplementary method. These drivers are all over and you can't escape them. They are dangerous, however, and they are the reason that there are multiple car pile-ups, because those tailgate drivers did not have time to react fast enough to avoid the rear-end collision.

Here's my theory. Traffic was moving along at a good clip, drivers of cars closely spaced, a bus in tow right behind them. A left turn signal is green and drivers are trying to make it. It turns yellow, and the first driver hits brakes, vehicles behind also do so, and each comes to a stop barely missing each other, but the bus... it can't stop as quick and must hit the last car in the line. All cars scoot forward and each is crunched together.

Now it may have not happened that way, but as often is the case, drivers are following too close to others, and the lead car may hit their brakes suddenly. It takes about a second to see, recognize, and react to lift your foot onto the brake pedal and begin pushing. It takes about another second to slow or stop sufficient to miss the vehicle in front of you. If we only put 1/2 second headways, and not 2 second headways of time between our vehicle and the one in front, then we will certainly HIT that vehicle when they jam their brakes. There is no way to avoid it. The same problem exists for us if we have someone on our tail too close, but there is not much we can do about that, except pull over and let them pass?

No, I really don't think that is the solution. This is a safety issue. Drivers everywhere need to understand that the distance they place themselves with the car in front of them while moving is critical. Like speeding, ticketing for tailgating should be enforced. Tailgating is aggressive unsafe driving and should be punished. Yet there is not enough real enforcement of correcting the problem.

I did find this article, however, dealing with some law enforcement cracking down on it.

Grant's simplified solution: Keep at lease a 2 second headway of time distance between your car and the one in front of you. Pull over and let tailgaters pass.

BackTrack Link for this post: http://prismengineering.blogspot.com/2009/05/school-bus-smash-up-how-does-this.html

TEXAS DOT in OVERHAUL

2009-05-11T11:23:00.000-07:00

This is a follow-up to another entry I made on how the texas house moves to kill state transportation commission

House approves transportation overhaul

A sweeping overhaul of the Texas Department of Transportation has been approved by the House.

The measure, including a new elected commissioner and a phase out of red-light cameras, next goes to the Senate for consideration.

The Texas Department of Transportation overhaul, which also calls for the election of 14 regional commissioners, was approved Monday by a 138-6 vote. The sweeping overhaul vote came in response to a scathing state report that called for more accountability and responsiveness to lawmakers and the public.

What an interesting development, approved Monday by a 138-6 vote. That's a mandate to all who work on transportation improvements and plans to be accountable to the public. Don't just do what you think is best, especially if it is unpopular. If a transportation plan is unpopular, not adequately understood, not appreciated, it's not the time to go pushing it through. Do what the people want. Listen to the wide cross section of public opinion and not just the few. If a few want toll roads, for instance, but the majority don't, then don't plan to build them. It should be that simple.

Grant's simplified solution: Government, listen to the voice of the people. It's their tax dollars at work.

BackTrack Link: http://prismengineering.blogspot.com/2009/05/texas-dot-in-overhaul.html

Those Traffic Signals!

2009-05-08T14:00:00.000-07:00

I read about a Town in England that is up and arms over the installation of signals, or is blaming signals for a recent accident, but this accident occurred at a traffic calming device, the "mini roundabout." Am I missing something?

It seems from the news articles as of late, that there is an anti-traffic signal sentiment in parts of England where some elected officials are fed up with traffic signals, and now, blaming them for unrelated traffic problems or accidents.

Here is a GOOGLE photo of the intersection in Barnards Green, Malvern, at the left. The accident involved a Toyota Corolla and a Ford Fiesta at the mini round-about at Pound Bank Road on Madresfield Road, in the Town of Malvern, United Kingdom. Town councillors pounced on this news and "called on the Highways Authority to consider measures following fears the road would turn into a rat-run with the introduction of new traffic lights in Barnards Green."

Here is a close up of that intersection, the mini roundabout traffic calming device. What is interesting to me is how Google Maps caught this large bus passing through the intersection right over the top of the mini roundabout center area (drivers drive on the left side of the road in England, so this bus is making a right turn from eastbound to southbound). The mini roundabout diameter is only about 40 feet at most, so it is not possible for large vehicles to go around the circle, they must go over the top of it as we see here.

There must be more to the story than meets the eye, because I can't get my head around the idea that traffic signals installed somewhere else somehow made this intersection unsafe? But that is the conclusion that this town is jumping to: blame the signals. I think it is this particular mini roundabout that is a contributing factor. There is no physical obstruction in the middle, as we can see the bus go right over painted striping. There are no stop signs. All drivers are given the honor system to allocate right of way, and apparently, it doesn't always work that way. The drivers of the Toyota Corolla and Ford Fiesta decided that they had the right of way and barreled through full speed ahead, at the same time.

I had an epiphany. I understand it. Traffic signals give drivers the idea that they can go through an intersection sometimes faster than 15 mph...?

Grant's simplified solution: Don't blame an accident that happens at one intersection on the traffic control at a distance intersection. It is not logical.

BackTrack Link for this post: http://prismengineering.blogspot.com/2009/05/those-traffic-signals.html

There's No Use In Trying To Be Dogmatic About It.

2009-05-08T11:17:00.000-07:00

Everybody to some extent is a Traffic Engineer. Everyone understands traffic to some extent, we all drive it, but those that got certified in it have a slight advantage with some science to back their opinions about it. Sometimes an engineer can come across as "dogmatic" if not careful about how information is presented.

I remember making a case before a transportation commission in a politically charged environment about the science behind the traffic model used by the County. The reason was that the model was not supporting answers that a particular vocal group wanted, and so it was necessary to "defend" the model...but after I concluded my power-point presentation I recall the one appointed commissioner who said "Well, I can't argue with your science."

I wasn't dogmatic about it. I was passionate, yes, but I was trying to persuade, not tell. I was trying to communicate as best I could that everything was alright with the numbers, with the science, with the results.

It is always true that while some can't argue the science, that doesn't mean that they have to BELIEVE it. It all boils down to a belief system of sorts. Those that don't run the science have to TRUST that those who did, did it right, and that the science is sound. In the end, it is the results that count. Are our roads better off today than they were 20 years ago? Don't answer that!

There are a lot of forces at play. The Traffic Engineers and Transportation Planners don't work in a vacuum, and it is not a perfect world where what they come up with is the end all be all solution. Far from it. The "science" goes through peer reviews, public reviews and presentations, and all in front of elected bodies of City Councils or County Supervisors, or both, and even State DOT's. Far from a vacuum, these well thought out plans go through much iteration, in fact, iteration after iteration, until it becomes acceptable. Sometimes a well thought out plan by all parties involved is thrown out because it is politically unacceptable, costs too much, or is extremely volatile in a meeting where emotions and passions run high.

No, the Traffic Engineer can never be dogmatic about anything. Once they try that approach they learn very quickly that everyone is a traffic engineer and understands traffic enough to not have to be talked down to... and that engineer finds themselves being run out of town on a rail. No, Traffic Engineers have to be humble people, willing to take it on the chin once in a while.

Grant's simplified solution: Engineers, be humble.

Texas House moves to kill state transportation commission

2009-05-08T08:27:00.000-07:00

This article caught my eye today because it illustrates how various branches of government and their committees and commissions enter into the transportation solutions conceived for a state, and thus local as well. In Texas, the Governor, the House, and the Senate are all controlled by Republicans, but that doesn't mean they all agree. We are talking about TRAFFIC!

...the House was able to make good on threats, made over the past two years, to rein in an agency many lawmakers feel has been unresponsive to them and too enamored with private toll roads.

The TX Transportation Commission consists of five commissioners appointed by governors every 2 years to serve 6 years terms... to govern the policy and direction of Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT). So its a pretty important position, and politically guides the decisions that the TxDOT makes in spending the billions of dollars allocated to them.

Apparently, the House (who has the power of the purse) is not pleased with the direction the Governor's commission is going lately with too many Toll Roads. Apparently they want more money spent on projects that will help the majority of their constituents, and not just the few that would benefit from Toll Roads...
The House wants the commission to be consisting of ELECTED members in a statewide public vote/election, and serve for 4 years each. Apparently, the House thinks that the Texas Transportation Commission is too insulated from the public.

You know, I've always liked our form of government for the people, by the people. If individual commissioners had to run an election, present themselves to the state voters for approval, make the case if you will as to why they should be on that commission, it would raise awareness to the people of the state that such a commission even exists, because frankly, this flies under the radar of most people who sometimes wonder why a state DOT does the things they do.

Grant's simplified solution: Government, listen to the voice of the people. It is their tax dollars at work.

When Stop Signs Become Warning or Speed Limit Signs

2009-05-07T00:44:00.000-07:00

Calming the Traffic in our world is a challenge. How we do it is left to a little subjectivity, and definitely a lot of creativity. This video illustrates one agency's idea for improving safety at a bridge, uses a little humor (hopefully!), and then presents the generally acceptable practice of installing traffic control device measures to help slow traffic down. Traffic calming (TC) introduces physical barriers or obstructions to the flow of traffic, that cause motorists to be unable to speed without going out of control. Seems a little crazy at first blush, and that is the rub. There is a risk that a motorist WILL go out of control, possibly cause the bodily harm that TC was intended to avoid, and cause liability to the city/county who installed the device. Generally speaking, these devices are primarily for residential streets or neighborhoods with slower speeds, where safety is always an issue and where children are often at play.

Like its big brother sibling the STOP SIGN, Traffic Calming devices are also misused/overused from time to time. Some of these devices, like a speed bump, can wreak havoc on a vehicles suspension system whether traversed fast or slow. Fast speeds over an "undulation" can contribute to a motorist unexpectedly losing control of their vehicle. That's not the intent, yet we still see them in wide use today despite the risks.

As a Traffic Engineer, I see the world of traffic through the eyes of trying to improve traffic flow, make things more efficient, and eliminate road hazards and safety issues that could contribute to accidents, and subsequently become a liability for a public agency. So I have a natural aversion to hindering traffic, although I understand the psychology of trying to make neighborhoods safer. Anecdotal observations would suggest that the goal of many residents is to get everyone driving past their home to go 5 mph, which BTW is an excruciatingly painful slow crawl (people walk that fast!). Since the prima facia speed limit for residential streets has always been 25 mph throughout the USA as a standard, its very difficult to get drivers to depart from that. Somewhere in the middle of all that is a 15 mph traffic calming device like a roundabout to put an obstruction in the way of fast moving traffic.

I think its a good compromise, the introduction of traffic calming devices, especially if all in the neighborhood can agree that this is what they want. There are quite a few devices that achieve the goal of calming streets in neighborhoods without being a potential hazard or damage to vehicles. Watch the video to get an idea of a few.

Grant's simplified solution: Listen to Bill Cosby more.

BackTrack Link for this post: http://prismengineering.blogspot.com/2009/05/when-stop-signs-become-warning-or-speed.html

TRAFFIC ENGINEERS turning to ILLUSIONS for SPEED SOLUTIONS?

2009-05-06T22:01:00.000-07:00

Traffic Engineers in Philadelphia are turning to ILLUSIONS to slow traffic down. Yes, putting 3D pictures of strange protrusions coming up out of the road to get drivers to slow down down.

Just when you think you've heard of everything!

I'm trying to imagine what it would be like to drive down a street, and get fooled by one of these illusions. I might have to stop my vehicle, in the middle of the street, get out and take a look to see what it is BEFORE I drive my vehicle over it and risk popping a tire or gouging a muffler.

The City put 100 of these all over the city in June 2008. Haven't heard how it went. The FEDS are involved (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA)), so hopefully it will be safe. It's also got the blessing of the State DOT (PennDOT).

My take on this new idea is, FOOL ME ONCE... it isn't going to work again on the typical driver. It isn't going to work again, because it is fake.

It seems that once a driver passes over one of these chalk-like paintings, it would begin to lose all effectiveness. My first thoughts were that it could create a hazard and subsequent liability problem. The illusion looks like spikes coming up out of the road and could startle a driver IMO, and cause some to swerve into oncoming traffic. I'm all for traffic calming, but this definitely comes under the "surprise" approach, and I don't think it is good to surprise drivers or cause distractions or unfamiliar items in the road. But you know, every time we try something "new" it will be a surprise.

Traffic Calming is an interesting animal. It seems to keep reinventing itself with ways to make traffic flow less efficient in order to get drivers to slow down. There's always the "free" pothole :) or cobblestone roads, but who wants to do that to their cars?

More from the Philadelphia program:

Additional traffic calming tools expected to be utilized during this project include:
• Flashing all red traffic lights (during late night hours) will be installed at selected signalized
intersections with minimal traffic volume.
• Innovative 3-D Markings that both slow down traffic by creating an illusion of an obstacle in
the roadway and serve as a reminder to the speeder that enforcement is underway.
• “Drive CarePhilly – 25mph – Heed the Speed” signs to be installed in areas with significant
children presence and residential neighborhoods.
• Additional speed humps.

Source: http://www.phila.gov/streets/PR_HeedTheSpeed.pdf

Grant's simplified solution: Minimize the surprise element when trying to design roads for regular people. It may cause an accident.

Freeway Signs and TOO MUCH INFO?

2009-05-05T13:46:00.000-07:00

The sign to the right (found in Wisconsin) is another good reason to suppose that some of the people responsible for putting up guide signs on our roads are not in tune with the purpose of it: to actually guide someone along their path in an efficient manner. A guide sign needs to be readable in a split second, because when a driver pays attention to a sign, they are not looking at the road. Make it quick. On this particular sign, it takes a second or two to comprehend each element, maybe with a double take because it is so unorthodox, and there are 6 separate elements on there! ...complete with a smart alec comment on the bottom! Even a NAVIGATOR would have to tell the driver "could you pull over to the side of the road for a minute while I study this sign?"

There's such a thing as TOO MUCH INFO.

Do we really need to know for instance, that "County I" is to the left, and "County J" is to the right? And shouldn't the left and right arrows be a warning sign like the one shown to the left? Rather than be black arrows on white which is a regulatory sign (a mandatory sign)? Do we really need it to say "HWY 13" crowding along with names of cities/towns too? How many cities/towns do we need to display? Wouldn't it just be better to put the name of a close town and leave it at that? Afterall, if we want to know the name of a route, such as HWY 13 we can just look along the side of the road and a sign indicating that will pop up sooner or later...
There is a reason we have standards in the MUTCD (Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices) so that drivers everywhere in the USA and beyond, will be able to have easily recognizable information in a readily recognizable format. I like this standard guide sign to the left. Isn't that just quick and simple? That's all this intersection needed, just the guide sign on top, and the yellow arrows on the bottom. Clean. Simple. Safer. It's important if for no other reason than to reduce distraction time to drivers and make our roads a little safer.

Grant's simplified solution: If you can afford it, get a GPS navigator assistant, and keep your eyes on the road.

Semi Truck Crashes in New Roundabout

2009-05-04T15:09:00.000-07:00

Roundabout conceptual drawing at 10 Mile Road intersection
source: www.wsdot.wa.gov and PRISM Engineering Group

Read story here: http://www.bellinghamherald.com

Here's a case when a new roundabout is not even officially finished yet, and the transition from regular intersection to roundabout seems to be a contributing factor to a serious accident involving a trucker at night.

Avtar S. Brar, 29, of Aldergrove, B.C., was driving north on the Guide at about 10 p.m. when he failed to slow for the new roundabout under construction at Ten Mile Road, according to Washington State Patrol. The truck went off the road and crashed into two utility poles before coming to rest in a retainer pond on the east side of the Guide.

Truck drivers are experienced drivers, and that's why this event is interesting. Why is a truck driver crashing at a roundabout? Why is he going too fast? Did he not fully comprehend that he was about to be forced to drive at 15 mph around a big circle? Did he see beyond the roundabout (it was night) and perceive that it was a straight shot and no signal there? SO many questions.

Yet these are questions that everyone responsible for safe and effective design of a roundabout should take seriously. When a change is made to a route, drivers that are used to the old way may get caught by surprise. Whenever we change traffic control at an intersection, the TRANSITION phase can be critical. Like in the case of the London Mayor and other council members favoring putting bags over traffic signal lights as an experiment (see next blog post), if they do that, they are taking a chance with liability issues. Whenever traffic control is changed, there is the transition period where adequate communication (signage, etc.) is absolutely necessary. It doesn't have to stay up forever, but the advance warnings need to be there.

Department of Transportation spokeswoman Bronlea Mishler said she is frustrated to hear so many people blaming the roundabout for the crash.

"Yes, it happened at a roundabout. Yes, it is horribly unfortunate," she said. "But don't vilify the roundabout; don't throw it under the bus for causing the accident. It's a driver error."

The DOT has had an education campaign to inform people about the roundabouts and has talked with trucking companies to get the word out about the changes. Mishler believes it will just take some time to get used to.

And yet we are left to wonder, was this due to the incompetence of a professional truck driver, or was it a lack of anticipating (and properly planning for) all scenarios that would face drivers in making split second decisions at a new traffic control device, such as at this roundabout.

Whatever traffic engineers do, make sure we have safety first, a sense of normalcy and familiarity in the road design and presentation, and then let the people govern themselves.

Grant's simplified solution: Roundabouts are still new in the USA, and adequate warnings for the slow 15 mph roundabout speed is needed. No surprises.

London Mayor Says Their Signal System is "Insane...Totally Crackers"

2009-05-02T20:56:00.000-07:00

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6207518.ece

In London, some elected officials are getting fed up with waiting at red lights. So what do they want to do about it? They are going to put BAGS over the lights "and drivers will be left to negotiate their way across by establishing eye contact with pedestrians and other motorists."

WOW. That sounds like a recipe for disaster, and a liability absolutely waiting to happen. Let's hope no one gets hurt.

I know too how personally frustrating it can be to sit at a signal when there is nobody there. But there ARE solutions to this, there are actuated signal systems with advance detection loops to take care of that. There really is no common sense reason that a city or a county would not properly time and program their signal system so that drivers don't have to wait a minute or more for nobody there. That's unacceptable, but it is not a reason to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Signals really are great tools, and a roundabout is not the only solution, in fact, the roundabout is a very expensive solution if you are going to have adequate capacity, but that is another story...

The article continues:
"What would happen if traffic lights were suddenly switched off? Would there be gridlock or would the queues of frustrated drivers miraculously disappear?"

I read this and I think, "if they only knew." Of course there will be gridlock, because if people are to be safe at an uncontrolled intersection, they will have to stop, look both ways, and for every single driver to do this will make the intersection operate just as a four way stop... and we all know how long the lines and queues of traffic are at a busy four way stop. Everyone has to stop. The advantage of signal systems is that they allow a long queue of vehicles to start moving, and then eventually all the cars are up to speed and the queue moves through the intersection with most vehicles crossing the stop bar at the speed limit. The average speed of all those vehicles is much higher than if every single vehicle had to come to a complete stop (average speed of all vehicles crossing stop bar is zero just before they accelerate).

So while people have to wait their turn to enter an intersection in a signal system, and often this wait is about a minute, the average speed of all vehicles entering the system is much higher, and averages to approximately 1/2 of the speed limit for all four approaches of an intersection. It really is kind of hard to calculate in our heads, and that's why we have software to run the thousands of calculations and using standard acceleration rates, etc., we can determine an "average" delay for all drivers at an intersection.

Article continues:

People in London are about to find out the answer in Britain’s first test of the theory that removing lights will cure congestion.

For six months, lights at up to seven junctions in Ealing will be concealed by bags and drivers will be left to negotiate their way across by establishing eye contact with pedestrians and other motorists.

Ealing Council believes that, far from improving the flow of traffic, lights cause delays and may even increase road danger. Drivers race towards green lights to make it across before they turn red. Confidence that they have right of way lulls them into a false sense of security, meaning that they fail to anticipate hazards coming from the side. The council hopes that drivers will learn to co-operate, crossing junctions on a first-come first-served basis rather than obeying robotic signals that have no sense of where people are waiting.

Westminster City Council is also considering a trial but has yet to identify likely junctions.

Ealing found evidence to support its theory when the lights failed one day at a busy junction and traffic flowed better than before. Councillors have approved a report which recommended that they “experimentally remove signals since experience of signal failure showed that junction worked well”.

The Conservative-controlled council has won the support of Boris Johnson, the Mayor of London, who is responsible for all 5,000 sets of lights in the capital through Transport for London.

Mr Johnson has voiced his frustration at having to wait at red lights in a car. He told the London Assembly last October: “I was driving around Ealing one Sunday and I found the traffic lights absolutely insane. Insane. There was hardly any pedestrian traffic to speak of and we were being kept at red for minute after minute. The thing was totally crackers.”

David Millican, a Conservative councillor and Ealing’s Cabinet member for transport, said: “We want to end the situation where no one is moving and time and space are being wasted. We respect walking and cycling but we also have to respect that people want to get around in their cars.”

Mr Millican said that pedestrian crossings would be relocated away from some junctions. Some lights would be replaced by “give way” signs and others by temporary mini-roundabouts painted on the road.

He said that the council was also considering having all lights flash at amber late at night, as in some European countries, signalling to drivers that they could proceed with caution. He also wants traffic turning left to be allowed to go through red lights at junctions where there would be no risk of causing collisions. He said that the turning on to the A40 at Perivale would be an ideal location for a trial of “turn left on red”.

This article was so amazing to me. It shows a lack of knowledge, and apparently, whoever is running the signal system over there is not communicating to the elected officials. Maybe there are two agendas at play there? Possibly an overly zealous traffic calming influence being applied by transportation departments to the signal systems to really slow things down (or negligence/incompetence?), combined with the impatience of those that want no part of that.

If I had my input there, I would first see that the signals are equipped with detector loops so that they could sense the presence of approaching vehicles, let alone those that are already waiting at a stop bar. I would have the signals timed with programming so that they would favor the heavy movements of traffic so that the majority of drivers would experience the least amount of delay. I would have the system be responsive to traffic volume patterns at different times of day. I would make sure that the signal could have very short cycle times, or even be interrupted by a waiting vehicle if there are no vehicles in competing movements. It's really that simple. Don't throw out the perfectly fine signals because someone is not programming them right.

I did a comparative analysis of three scenarios at an intersection. All the same volume of traffic, but with different traffic control. (click on image to left for larger size) The first was a signal installation with a 75 second typical cycle. The second was to put bags over the signals and let people operate as "yield on entry" and the third was to install stop signs for each of the four approaches. You can see that the signal had the highest average speed for each motorist and lowest delays (27 seconds of average delay per motorist), and the shortest queues as seen in the microsimulation screen shot.

The YIELD scenario had speeds almost twice as slow, and overall average delay of 78 seconds per vehicle, three times SLOWER, and queues two to three times as long!
The STOP scenario was worse, with average delay of 105 seconds per vehicle (almost two minutes of delay, average!), and 11 mph average speed.

I sincerely hope no one gets hurt when the bags cover the traffic signal lights. I think that would be an easy win for the plaintiff in court.

Grant's simplified solution: Program the signals to favor the heavy traffic flows.

Signed Out

2009-05-01T12:14:00.000-07:00

OK, take a look, and look close. Are we using too many signs, and is this use of the stop sign appropriate, or even legal? I mean, there is no intersection here! It is the beginning of a bridge. A bridge with K-Rails. Was the stop sign intended as a forced "slow down" speed control device? Is this the purpose, or is a stop sign to provide safety at intersections?

Stop signs are found all over the world. In Europe they tend to be used far more sparingly than in North America. In the United States, the stop sign is not intended for use as a traffic calming device; it is meant to be installed mainly for safety and/or to assign right-of-way for a certain direction. There are signs created for the purpose of warning drivers of a potentially unsafe condition where speeds should be reduced. For instance, a warning sign:

This sign warns drivers adequate enough, but is it because it does not carry the big stick of enforcement and fines, that drivers actually get the opportunity to think for themselves whether their speed is appropriate or not, rather than a mandatory stop at the beginning of a bridge?

To make matters worse, the bridge is not even that narrow. It seems logical that most drivers when faced with this choice of obedience or non-compliance from day to day, would begin to grow resentful of such an installation, because as the old adage goes, "familiarity breeds contempt" and when there is no logical reason to have to stop here, people are going to take their chances with the ticket.

As a Traffic Engineer who loves what he does, I am in favor of installations that would hopefully engender respect for the law, and I am opposed to the use of a stop sign for arbitrary speed control (or in this case, stop control for no logical reason, its not that unsafe at all at slow speeds!). The speed limit sign plays the role of a regulatory enforceable sign, but even speed limit signs can't be set up to force slow speeds if a radar survey can't support it. You can't just put up 5 mph speed limit signs (well you can't but they can't be enforced, they'll just be ignored if they breed contempt).

Stop signs are to provide right-of-way assignment to traffic at an intersection junction, not slow traffic down. There are much better ways to slow traffic down with traffic calming devices, physical methods to slow speeds, rather than breed contempt for a very important sign, the Stop Sign.

Grant's simplified solution: Use stop signs where they are needed for what people expect them for, so drivers will respect them.

Intelligent Transportation Systems Under Attack

2009-04-29T13:47:00.000-07:00

We use the term "intelligent transportation system" (or ITS) to describe communications technology for vehicles, etc., in an effort to improve safety, reduce delays and fuel consumption. But apparently this technology is under a vandal's prank attack in a creative and potentially dangerous way: by a hacker of computers. Watch this video to see how.

Intelligent transportation systems vary in technologies used, but generally include:
1) traffic signal control systems (coordinated signals),
2) variable message signs, etc.
3) Electronic toll collection (ETC) makes it possible for vehicles to drive through toll gates at traffic speed.
4) Cordon zones with congestion pricing is charged automatically using electronic toll collection or automatic number plate recognition, since stopping the users at conventional toll booths would cause long queues, long delays, and even gridlock. The main objective of this charge is to reduce traffic congestion within the cordon area.
5) Automatic road enforcement: Speed cameras that identify vehicles traveling over the legal speed limit. Red light cameras that detect vehicles that cross a stop line or designated stopping place while a red traffic light is showing.

Modern Roundabouts, a Primer on the Pros and Cons

2009-04-20T00:50:00.000-07:00

There are definitely pros and cons to a roundabout installation versus a signal installation. Personally, I like roundabouts. I like them a lot... especially when I am sitting at a signal, red light is stopping me, when no one else is there on the side street, and I am asking myself "why do we have to sit here and wait unnecessarily for that signal to turn green when I can go now!" So many times we wait, rather than risk the ticket, a huge fine, with accompanying insurance premium escalations, the net sum total being thousands of additional dollars added to my cost to drive. Its not worth the risk of that, so we wait. But I dream of a roundabout in such moments, and how I might have saved a minute. They are costly, however. You get what you pay for. I like signals too. Who doesn't like being able to travel at 50 mph through several miles of intersections, undelayed, in a commute hour when the signals are timed and coordinated to move platoons of traffic along. Can't beat that, when you can get it. Saving time and reducing delay. My experience is that there are only a few scenarios where I can travel in a platoon of traffic, sail through intersection after intersection at a certain time of day. The truth of it? It's a rare event. It has been years for me since I experienced it. Because while one direction of traffic is moving along nicely, the cross traffic on such a street is impacted with more delay to accommodate the increased green times. It's better than no coordination at all for sure, but there are trade-offs to get this kind of throughput for the majority using signals. But roundabouts? What's the tradeoff? Only the SPEED through the intersection. You must always go about 20 mph when traveling through, rather than 50 mph if you have a green light at a signal.

When it is time to mitigate an intersection because of capacity issues or accidents, etc., a traffic signal installation can help double or triple capacity/throughput instantly, even without any additional lanes! So there is definitely benefit to the signal over the stop sign. The traffic signal option is generally the cost of the signal hardware and labor to install. If additional lanes are needed to increase capacity, the costs can escalate dramatically as widening of the road several hundred feet back from the intersection to accommodate new turn lanes, shifted through lanes, and transitions, etc. ($million plus is not uncommon).

A roundabout's installation cost is generally a $million plus. Usually, additional right of way is needed when installing a roundabout at an existing intersection to facilitate the large diameters needed for higher capacity situations (to compete with the capacity a signal provides). An intersection expansion at existing corners to accommodate a 100-200' diameter circular intersection (depending on capacity needs) usually involves moving power poles, utilities, conduit, drainage pipe systems, the modification of slopes and grades appropriate for a circular design, etc., all of which involve expensive civil design plans and construction. Once built, the roundabout typically provides a safer, slower speed condition, and reduces accident rates and their severity, offers higher capacity per lane (since traffic is always moving), and has an attractive aesthetic appeal often with landscaping within the center circle. They are hard to beat, if you can afford this option.

To be fair, there are options for roundabouts where a smaller version can fit within an existing intersection (where there are low volumes), but this option would need to be validated with a traffic engineering operations analysis to determine capacity and level of service performance expected, given existing and future volumes of traffic. A smaller roundabout lacks the landscaping, the visual appeal, are more cramped resulting in large truck aprons in the center island.

Grant's simplified solution: Choose the traffic control that offers the most bang for the buck with the tax dollars available.

Be a Traffic Engineer!

2009-04-11T15:01:00.000-07:00

http://armorgames.com/play/3515/i-love-traffic

Ever see a police officer directing traffic at an intersection? It's not as easy as it looks! Its hard to keep traffic moving, and traffic can back up very quickly. Better to leave the work to a traffic signal timed controller (traffic actuated). But try the game, see for yourself. It's actually a lot of fun.

From what I have observed in the field, when large events are over and traffic hits the road, a signal at an intersection can get overwhelmed with excess traffic from a particular direction. Since the timing for a traffic signal is typically set up for a signal cycle length such as a minute or two, when the green light turns red and other directions get the green light, a police officer can help. But when heavy traffic is coming from all directions, the human interface can break down under the pressure, and traffic backs up! Try the game, and see why a traffic signal is the best choice.

Road Design Gone Bad?

2009-04-10T13:36:00.000-07:00

Some possible solutions for an intersection such as this can be found with proper traffic engineering to effectively and safely control traffic flow. The civil design of the intersection is apparently substandard for the average motorist, causes confusion and yields unexpected forces resulting in vehicle spin or slippage under wet conditions. The problem approach of this intersection needs to be mitigated with appropriate traffic control, such as traffic calming and a stop sign. Vehicles should never be allowed to enter at regular speeds since the corner angle, pavement slope and slick surface seem to contribute to potential vehicle rotation, resulting in accidents. Vehicle speeds for this approach need to be slowed by traffic calming, and ideally bring traffic to a complete stop (with stop sign) before entering the intersection.

Grant's simplified solution: Fix dangerous intersections. Quick. This should have never happened.

Modern Roundabouts are an alternative to Signal installations, but not in all cases.

2008-12-15T15:07:00.000-08:00

The modern roundabout is different from the traffic circle: it has yield on entry, and the traffic within the circle have the right-of-way. This important distinction insures that the circular intersection will not have a traffic jam. Here is an instructional video that shows how a modern roundabout works, what are its strong points, etc.

There are some circumstances in which a modern roundabout it not a good fit for a particular intersection. This includes situations in which there is not ample right-of-way available to install a circle of adequate size to achieve the capacity needed to keep traffic moving. Even a roundabout can jam if under-designed, or if it is close to other intersections where traffic can back up into the roundabout. Once a roundabout has even one of its exits jammed from traffic backing up, the whole intersection is gridlocked until it can clear. This is one of the disadvantages to installing a roundabout near to other intersections where this might occur. In cases like these the traffic signal is actually a better solution since it has a smaller footprint at the intersection and can keep traffic moving according to demand (loop detection). If one exit from a signalized intersection is jammed, it is still possible for vehicles to block the intersection, but typically the cross street can keep moving without interruption, given the green light.

The decision to install a roundabout versus a signal should be considered on a case by case basis, as there are advantages to each type of intersection traffic control.

Commendation from Dwayne Chisam, Public Works Director, City of Los Banos, CA (2006-2008)

2008-10-01T22:56:00.000-07:00

Dwayne wrote: "The City was looking for a means to assure the City Council and the public that the traffic impacts of future development are addressed in a comprehensive realistic manner that was easy to understand and predictable. Prism Engineering was successful in preparing a transportation program for the City that met those goals and was universally hailed by the City Council, Planning Commission, Merced County Association of Governments, Cal-Trans and the development community as a model for all Cities wanting to plan for their transportation future."

Dwayne Chisam the Public Works Director said:
" In all my 25 years of municipal government experience I have never had a program that was more universally accepted. Prism was a pleasure to work with, and the finished product positioned the City to proactively address their transportation issues rather than react as was the case for many years."

The City of Los Banos Transportation Master Plan Report based on the City's General Plan of 2007/2008 can be found in the REPORTS section on www.prismworld.com. A revised version of the report based on a General Plan amendment is in the works and will be completed in 2009.

Resume of Grant P. Johnson, PE, PTOE

2008-09-10T00:04:00.000-07:00

GRANT P. JOHNSON, P.E., P.T.O.E.
Principal, PRISM Engineering Group LLC
EDUCATION
B.S. in Civil Engineering - California State University, Sacramento, 1984

REGISTRATIONS Professional Traffic Operations Engineer (P.T.O.E.) in USA Certificate No. PTOE0063 received May 1999
Professional Engineer in California Traffic Engineer (T.E.) Certificate No. TR001453 received April 1987	Professional Engineer in Oregon Traffic Engineering (P.E.) Certificate No. 60769PE received May 1999

AFFILIATIONS / ACTIVITIES

Part-time Instructor at Los Rio Community College in Internet Technologies (1997)
Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE) - Member Status
Technical Chair, ITE
Speaker, MINUTP @ League of California Cities Convention, Anaheim, CA
Speaker, NETSIM/ MINUTP @ ITE Conference, Las Vegas, NV
Speaker, Highway Capacity @ ITE Conference, Denver, CO
ITE District 6 Sub-Committee Chair for WesternITE on the WWW
Speaker, Traffic Operations @ ITE District 6 Conference, Fresno, CA
Speaker, Internet Uses @ ITE District 6 Conference, Fresno, CA Speaker, Roundabout Speaker, Alternative Solutions @ ITE District 6 Conference, Salt Lake City, UT
Speaker, Traffic Operations @ ITE Central Valley Workshop, Fresno, CA

PROFESSIONAL HISTORY

2000-present Founder, PRISM Engineering Group LLC
1999-2000 Senior Associate, DEA, Inc.
1994-1999 Founder, SPECTRUM Engineering
1993-1994 Sacramento Region Office Manager, TJKM
1984-1993 TJKM

REPRESENTATIVE EXPERIENCE

TRAFFIC MODEL DEVELOPMENT
City of LosBanos TRANSCAD Traffic Model author, and Engineering for City-wide Transportation Master Plan.
Nevada County Transportation Commission NCTC TRANSCAD Traffic Model author.
Developed the original city-wide traffic models for Vacaville, Rio Vista, Davis, West Sacramento, Stockton, and Lodi.
NCTC Sub Area Studies and traffic model updates/calibration/validation.
Calaveras County Transportation Commission - the County-wide traffic model was updated and calibrated, and used for development of County's Regional Transportation Plan.
Nevada County-wide traffic model update, added several new trip purposes, refined trip generation and HCM assignment techniques.
Town of Truckee traffic model conversion and update, calibration/validation, used in Regional Study.
Town of Truckee Capital Improvement Program and Mitigation Fee Study.
Project manager for several county-wide Master Plan Projects and Transportation Circulation Studies for government agencies including Nevada, El Dorado, Amador, and Calaveras and Tuolumne Counties. Public Presentations. Regional Transportation Master Plans.

TRAFFIC OPERATIONS -

Traffic Operations Study throughout Nevada County. Analyzed traffic for over 35 intersections and street segments using HCM, Synchro Pro, etc. All traffic counts were video-taped. E Size full color graphics of each intersection system communicating accident history and location, traffic counts, striping detail, locations of signs, etc. These drawings were used as a base for detailed illustrations of each proposed alternative, including coordinated signal systems and design as well as some modern roundabout installations. Highlights of this study:
Operations level of service calculations
Signal systems coordination analyses and optimization, and recommended installations, incl time-space diagrams
30 Full color detailed E-Size plans of each location and alternatives
Introduction of modern roundabout to area
Creative geometric low-cost solutions for trouble intersections using existing right of way
Animations of traffic (simulations)
Hi-res Video highlight summary of peak traffic problems

TRANSPORTATION PLANNING, TRAFFIC MODELING -

PROJECT STUDY REPORTS (P.S.R.) FOR CALTRANS - Principal Manager of work for preliminary PSR analysis along the S.R. 99 corridor near Ripon for the Jack Tone Interchange Alternatives Analyses examining the Northeastern Annexation Area. Preparation of traffic section in several P.S.R.'s in Vacaville, West Sacramento, and Nevada County for major interchange improvements or new installations. Manager on Caltrans Highway 49 Route Adoption Study using traffic modeling for analysis of freeway corridor alternatives on Highway 49 in Nevada County.
TRAINING SEMINARS - Conducted several training sessions on the use of traffic models and intersection analysis software at the Cities of Vacaville, Petaluma, Lodi, and for the Counties of Nevada, Calaveras and Tuolumne.
TRAFFIC SIGNALS - Designed formal plans and specifications in Fresno, Lodi, Vacaville, Chico, Davis, Stockton and Sacramento. Assembled VISSIM and SIMTRAFFIC models for use in optimization of signal timing and flow progression.
STREET LIGHTING DESIGN - Principal Manager for Street Light Design in El Dorado County, and new street lighting along major arterials in the City of Chico. Prepared formal plans and specifications for each street light system designed.
PARKING STUDIES - Principal Manager of City of Eureka Downtown and Henderson Business District studies. Principal Manager of Hutchins Street Square Parking Study in the City of Lodi. Manager of studies in Sacramento for Alkali Flat and Del Paso Heights communities.
TRAFFIC CONTROL DEVICE INVENTORIES (TCDI) - Manager for City-wide TCDI in Lodi, CA using GPS for data collection and interfacing data with City's GIS Internet ready MapGuide system. Manager for County-wide TCDI in San Joaquin County. Project Engineer on TCDI completed for the County of El Dorado.
UNDERGROUND DISTRICTS - Designed several underground districts in the City of Chico with plats and descriptions for the various districts, PGandE coordination, etc.
COMPUTER PROGRAMMING, SOFTWARE SKILLS Author (Webmaster) of several WWW sites, including prismworld.com, ITE's westernite.org, etc. Ran Internet Service Provider company to the Sacramento Region. Designed and authored computer software, with specific application to Traffic Engineering. Advanced experience in use of TRANSCAD, TP+, MINUTP, etc.
IMPACT STUDIES - Completed hundreds of simple and complex traffic impact studies for various residential, commercial, and industrial developments in numerous cities and counties in California and Nevada.

DATABASES / INTERNET APPLICATIONS -

Since 1995. Specializing in setting up secure Windows NT networks (permissions-based) using multiple servers to distribute information on TCP IP based backbone over Intranets and Internet. Database SQL Servers, WWW Servers, FTP, Gopher, and Email Servers running on separate machines and networked. Interfacing internet pages with Databases for dynamic and interactive pages. Latest projects include GIS applications which produce graphical information as a result of database interaction and processing of data in programming code before it is delivered to the internet. Designing collaborative web sites which interface two-way forms with Microsoft SQL Server and/or Access database. Built Intranet-based KIOSK system for Arden Hills Country Club.