Evaluating the benefits and interactions of route guidance and traffic control strategies using simulation

In order to estimate the potential benefits of route guidance and to examine the interactions between this and other traffic management studies, a simulation was performed on a representative traffic network consisting of a freeway and a parallel arterial. Different freeway and arterial incident scenarios were examined and, for each scenario, the impact of having various percentages of drivers equipped with a route guidance system was investigated. The incremental benefits of route guidance are found to be greatest for the first 20% of drivers with in-vehicle units, but further benefits continue to be obtained when the market penetration increases up to 100%. These benefits are the largest for incident scenarios, and increase with the duration of the incident. It is speculated that for normal traffic conditions only a few drivers need to reroute themselves to maintain an equilibrium assignment. However, an incident causes a greater disturbance in the equilibrium and therefore requires a greater percentage of drivers to reroute themselves before the new equilibrium can be reached.<>