TRAFFIC ACTIVITY DESCRIBED IN TERMS OF SOME CHARACTERISTICS OF AN URBAN AREA

In this paper an attempt is made to summarize simply the traffic situation in an urban area in which commuters travel to and from work using a rectangular network of roads. The positions of homes and work places are denoted by x and y co-ordinates. It is assumed that homes and workplaces are distributed over the urban area according to Sherratt's law. That is, the x and y co-ordinates of homes and workplaces are normally distributed. The quadrivariate normal distribution is used to extend sherratt's model to allow correlation between the location of homes and workplaces and it allows a separation between the centre of homes and the centre of workplaces. The average distance travelled, the expected number of times one commuter's path crosses another's and a measure of the amount of traffic at a specified point in the urban area are all calculated. These three indicators of traffic activity are expressed in terms of four basic parameters of an urban area: i.e. the spread of homes, the spread of workplaces, the distance between the centre of homes and the centre of workplaces and the correlation between the location of a home and a workplace. Models for trips other than work trips can be similarly described and a transportation planning model can be constructed by the superposition of several of these simple models. /TRRL/

• Corporate Authors:

  Pergamon Press, Incorporated

  Maxwell House, Fairview Park
  Elmsford, NY  United States  10523
• Authors:
  • VAUGHAN, R
• Publication Date: 1974-12

Language

• English

Media Info

• Features: Figures; References; Tables;
• Pagination: p. 553-565
• Serial:
  • Transportation Research /UK/
  • Volume: 8
  • Issue Number: 6
  • Publisher: Pergamon Press, Incorporated

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Calculation; Commuters; Distance; Dwellings; Length; Networks; Roads; Statistical analysis; Statistical distributions; Travel; Urban areas; Work trips; Workplaces
• Uncontrolled Terms: Position; Road networks
• ITRD Terms: 6464: Calculation; 6572: Distribution (stat); 308: Dwelling; 698: Journey; 6488: Length; 9061: Location; 1053: Road network; 313: Urban area; 300: Workplace
• Subject Areas: Data and Information Technology; Highways; Operations and Traffic Management; Passenger Transportation; Terminals and Facilities; I71: Traffic Theory;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00125106
• Record Type: Publication
• Source Agency: Transport and Road Research Laboratory (TRRL)
• Files: ITRD, TRIS
• Created Date: Nov 18 1975 12:00AM