Guide to Establishing Monitoring Programs for Travel Time Reliability

Travel time reliability can be defined as consistency of travel time over time. The primary goal of the Strategic Highway Research Program 2 (SHRP 2) Reliability research is to improve the reliability of highway travel times by mitigating the effects of events that cause travel times to fluctuate unpredictably. Through this research, seven sources of unreliable travel times have been identified: traffic incidents, work zones, demand fluctuations, special events, traffic control devices, weather, and inadequate base capacity. This guide documents the research of the L02 Project, Establishing Monitoring Programs for Travel Time Reliability. It also provides further discussion of how to develop and use a travel time reliability monitoring system (TTRMS). The Guide will be useful for system operators in determining what actions they need to take to reduce the variability of travel time and enhance reliability. A TTRMS can help operating agencies monitor system performance, understand the impacts of the various factors that influence travel time, and provide credible information to system users about what travel time reliability to expect. With this information, operating agencies can make better decisions about what actions to take to help improve reliability. At the time this research was performed, most transportation agencies did not have these capabilities. The Guide has two parts. Chapters 1 through 5 describe the process of measuring, characterizing, identifying, and understanding the effects of recurrent congestion and nonrecurrent events that affect travel time reliability. The appendices provide more detailed information about the functional specification of a monitoring system, methods, a series of case studies, and a set of use cases that describe how different users of the TTRMS interact with the system. Accompanying the Guide is a brief, stand-alone document that provides suggestions for communicating information about time travel reliability using maps, figures, and tables.

• Record URL:
  http://www.trb.org/Publications/Blurbs/168764.aspx
• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://www.trb.org/Main/Blurbs/168764.aspx
• Authors:
  • List, George
  • Williams, Billy
  • Rouphail, Nagui
  • Hranac, Rob
  • Barkley, Tiffany
  • Mai, Eric
  • Ciccarelli, Armand
  • Rodegerdts, Lee
  • Karr, Alan F
  • Zhou, Xuesong
  • Wojtowicz, Jeffrey
  • Schofer, Joseph
  • Khattak, Asad
  • 0000-0002-0790-7794
• Publication Date: 2014

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Digital/other
• Features: Figures; Glossary; Maps; Photos; References; Tables;
• Pagination: 641p
• Serial:
  • SHRP 2 Report
  • Issue Number: S2-LO2-RR-2
  • Publisher: Transportation Research Board

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Case studies; Handbooks; Highway travel; Monitoring; Nonrecurrent congestion; Traffic congestion; Traffic control centers; Travel time
• Uncontrolled Terms: Travel time reliability
• Subject Areas: Data and Information Technology; Highways; Operations and Traffic Management; Planning and Forecasting; I72: Traffic and Transport Planning; I73: Traffic Control;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01479830
• Record Type: Publication
• ISBN: 9780309129732
• Report/Paper Numbers: SHRP 2 Report S2-L02-RR-2
• Files: TRIS, TRB, ATRI
• Created Date: Apr 25 2013 1:00PM