Road design influence on driving behaviors: The influence of curve design, a case study
Road geometry has always been a key feature for road safety concerns. It will become more crucial in the context of future transportation, especially with the advent of Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CAVs). In fact, recognizable and intuitive road alignments would simplify the driving tasks for...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Elsevier
2025-12-01
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| Series: | Transport Economics and Management |
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| Online Access: | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2949899625000073 |
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| author | Stefano Coropulis Nicola Berloco Paolo Intini Vittorio Ranieri |
| author_facet | Stefano Coropulis Nicola Berloco Paolo Intini Vittorio Ranieri |
| author_sort | Stefano Coropulis |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Road geometry has always been a key feature for road safety concerns. It will become more crucial in the context of future transportation, especially with the advent of Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CAVs). In fact, recognizable and intuitive road alignments would simplify the driving tasks for both humans and CAVs (independently from the rate of automation). Thus, not only building consistent and self-explaining roads is fundamental for new and old vehicles, but also adjusting the existent ones, operation that seems even harder. Since most of the existing roads would need massive interventions, policy makers and road designers might choose between making adjustments being compliant with the current regulations in toto or adopting countermeasures supported by specific safety assessments to make existing roads safer, also in the perspective of future changes. In this optic, the present study tries to investigate a typical geometric design issue of existing roads, i.e., the presence of a long segment followed by a sharp curve without transition curves on undivided two-way two-lane rural roads. This alignment does not reflect the current recommendations for road alignment, so it was investigated the effect of such a design on users and safety for a specific testbed. The users’ behavior was investigated recording the kinematic parameters of the traveling vehicles. This data collection was run using radar traffic counters, placed on the roadside throughout the entire layout of the investigated segment-curve, to get speed and acceleration. The data were elaborated to investigate driving behavior in free-flow conditions. A K-means cluster analysis was run to characterize the users’ behaviors in terms of speed and acceleration. Hard braking was found to be strongly related to high speed, as well as ongoing deceleration on curve was detected for all the vehicles with high speeds on the segment. Results about users’ behaviors were compared to the available crash dataset to understand the possible implications of human factors on occurred crashes and to simulate the decision process of safety-related adjustments of existing roads. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-482f774bbc6f4e3892a0c7e7af6b38be |
| institution | OA Journals |
| issn | 2949-8996 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-12-01 |
| publisher | Elsevier |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Transport Economics and Management |
| spelling | doaj-art-482f774bbc6f4e3892a0c7e7af6b38be2025-08-20T02:11:11ZengElsevierTransport Economics and Management2949-89962025-12-01310411610.1016/j.team.2025.02.006Road design influence on driving behaviors: The influence of curve design, a case studyStefano Coropulis0Nicola Berloco1Paolo Intini2Vittorio Ranieri3Department of Civil, Environmental, Land, Building Engineering and Chemistry “DICATECh”. Politecnico di Bari, Via Orabona 4, Bari 70125, Italy; Corresponding author.Department of Civil, Environmental, Land, Building Engineering and Chemistry “DICATECh”. Politecnico di Bari, Via Orabona 4, Bari 70125, ItalyDepartment of Engineering for Innovation. Ecotekne Center, University of Salento, S.P. 6, Lecce, Monteroni, Lecce (LE) 73100, ItalyDepartment of Civil, Environmental, Land, Building Engineering and Chemistry “DICATECh”. Politecnico di Bari, Via Orabona 4, Bari 70125, ItalyRoad geometry has always been a key feature for road safety concerns. It will become more crucial in the context of future transportation, especially with the advent of Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CAVs). In fact, recognizable and intuitive road alignments would simplify the driving tasks for both humans and CAVs (independently from the rate of automation). Thus, not only building consistent and self-explaining roads is fundamental for new and old vehicles, but also adjusting the existent ones, operation that seems even harder. Since most of the existing roads would need massive interventions, policy makers and road designers might choose between making adjustments being compliant with the current regulations in toto or adopting countermeasures supported by specific safety assessments to make existing roads safer, also in the perspective of future changes. In this optic, the present study tries to investigate a typical geometric design issue of existing roads, i.e., the presence of a long segment followed by a sharp curve without transition curves on undivided two-way two-lane rural roads. This alignment does not reflect the current recommendations for road alignment, so it was investigated the effect of such a design on users and safety for a specific testbed. The users’ behavior was investigated recording the kinematic parameters of the traveling vehicles. This data collection was run using radar traffic counters, placed on the roadside throughout the entire layout of the investigated segment-curve, to get speed and acceleration. The data were elaborated to investigate driving behavior in free-flow conditions. A K-means cluster analysis was run to characterize the users’ behaviors in terms of speed and acceleration. Hard braking was found to be strongly related to high speed, as well as ongoing deceleration on curve was detected for all the vehicles with high speeds on the segment. Results about users’ behaviors were compared to the available crash dataset to understand the possible implications of human factors on occurred crashes and to simulate the decision process of safety-related adjustments of existing roads.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2949899625000073Road design geometryHuman driversCurvesRoad standardsDriving adaptation |
| spellingShingle | Stefano Coropulis Nicola Berloco Paolo Intini Vittorio Ranieri Road design influence on driving behaviors: The influence of curve design, a case study Transport Economics and Management Road design geometry Human drivers Curves Road standards Driving adaptation |
| title | Road design influence on driving behaviors: The influence of curve design, a case study |
| title_full | Road design influence on driving behaviors: The influence of curve design, a case study |
| title_fullStr | Road design influence on driving behaviors: The influence of curve design, a case study |
| title_full_unstemmed | Road design influence on driving behaviors: The influence of curve design, a case study |
| title_short | Road design influence on driving behaviors: The influence of curve design, a case study |
| title_sort | road design influence on driving behaviors the influence of curve design a case study |
| topic | Road design geometry Human drivers Curves Road standards Driving adaptation |
| url | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2949899625000073 |
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