Traffic flow analysis on inter-city expressway for emergency situation

Traffic accident on inter-city expressways might cause large-scale traffic congestion. It might increase travel times of many drivers and it produces a large social loss. This study aims to estimate the social loss of travel time of drivers caused by traffic accidents on inter-city expressway using traffic simulation model, and to evaluate the effects of outflow recommendations when an accident occurs on the expressway. The traffic simulation model on Tomei Expressway is constructed to estimate the dynamic traffic congestion. Travel time losses of drivers are estimated by the simulation results with hypothetical traffic accidents. It is understood that the total losses of travel times are depending on the positions of accident spots and the occurrence times of accidents, because it might influence to congestion at the bottlenecks of flow capacity. Moreover, the effect of traffic control in emergency situation is discussed. The influences of outflow recommendations for drivers are estimated using the traffic simulation model.