Office of Operations
21st Century Operations Using 21st Century Technologies

Analysis, Modeling, and Simulation for Traffic Incident Management Applications

Foreword

Notice

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Technical Report Documentation Page

1. Report No.

FHWA-HOP-12-045

2. Government Accession No.

3. Recipient’s Catalog No.

4. Title and Subtitle

Analysis, Modeling, and Simulation for Traffic Incident Management Applications

5. Report Date

July 2012

6. Performing Organization Code

7. Author(s)

Richard Margiotta, Rick Dowling, and Jawad Paracha

8. Performing Organization Report No.

9. Performing Organization Name and Address

Cambridge Systematics, Inc.
4800 Hampden Lane
Bethesda, MD 20814

10. Work Unit No. (TRAIS)

11. Contract or Grant No.

DTFG-61-D-00004

12. Sponsoring Agency Name and Address

U.S. Department of Transportation
Federal Highway Administration
Office of Operations (HOP)
1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
Washington, DC 20590

13. Type of Report and Period Covered

Final Report, July, 2012

14. Sponsoring Agency Code

HOTO

15. Supplementary Notes

FHWA Contracting Officer’s Task Manager (COTM): Jawad Paracha

16. Abstract

Traffic incidents are a major source of congestion in both urban and rural areas. Nationally, roughly 25 percent of total congestion is due to traffic incidents. Further, traffic incidents create unexpected congestion – congestion that occurs in times and places where travelers don’t expect to be delayed – and are therefore a major source of frustration for travelers.

Implementing Traffic Incident Management (TIM) strategies has proven to be a highly cost-effective way of treating congestion problems. However, a strong need exists to be able to predict what the impacts of TIM strategies will be at the planning stage of project development and to monitor the effects of TIM programs.

To support modeling and evaluation of TIM strategies, this document provides a synthesis of analysis, modeling, and simulation (AMS) methods for incident impacts. The focus is on incidents effects on congestion and reliability as well as secondary incidents, for the purpose of estimating benefits and evaluating programs and proposed strategies. This document covers several specific topics including: a synthesis of AMS methods for incidents, TIM AMS application areas, data required to undertake modeling and evaluations of TIM strategies, and identification of future improvements to TIM AMS applications.

17. Key Words

Traffic incident management, modeling, simulation, performance measures TIM

18. Distribution Statement

No restrictions.

19. Security Classif. (of this report)

Unclassified

20. Security Classif. (of this page)

Unclassified

21. No of Pages

54

22. Price

N/A

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