National Institute for Transportation and Communities

• Download the Final Report (PDF)
• Download the Project Brief (PDF)

Advances in transportation technology — e-scooters and bike share, Lyft & Uber, and autonomous vehicles — are beginning to have profound impacts on cities. New mobility is changing not only how we travel, but also urban form and development itself. In the near future, we can expect differences in what public transit looks like, the layout of cities, and the places we spend our time. In turn,...

• Download the Final Report (PDF)
• Download the Project Brief (PDF)
• Register for the Jan 22, 2020 webinar
• See a slideshow on "Emerging Technologies and Cities" presented by Becky Steckler at the 2019 OAPA Annual Conference in Eugene, OR
• Download the guidebook "Navigating New Mobility: Policy Approaches for Cities" (PDF)

What was...

It can be expected that automated vehicles and human-driven vehicles will coexist in the transportation network for quite some time. In order to support various traffic control tasks it is critical to develop a reliable model to understand the real-time traffic patterns in this mixed environment. A new report from the National Institute for Transportation and Communities (NITC) contributes three new tools to help planners model freeway traffic with both connected automated vehicles (CAVs) and human-driven vehicles (HVs). 

RESEARCH TEAM

The project...

PRESENTATION ARCHIVE

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OVERVIEW

Although connected vehicles (CVs) will soon go beyond testbeds, CVs and human-driven vehicles (HVs) will co-exist over a long period. Hence, it is critical to consider the interactions between these two types of vehicles in traffic flow modeling. In this study, we aim to develop a macroscopic model to understand how CVs would impact HVs in the traffic stream. Grounded on the second-order traffic flow model, we study the relationships among flow, density, and speed by two sets of formulations for the groups of CVs and HVs, respectively. A set of friction factors, which indicate CVs' impact to HVs, are introduced to the speed equation for accounting CV speed impacts. Then extended Kalman Filter is employed to update both model parameters and friction factors in real-time. By using CVs trajectory data as measurements, the difference between CV average speed and overall traffic mean speed will be fully accounted. The proposed model will serve as a basis for designing CV-based traffic control function,...