Steady-State Car-Following Time Gaps: An Empirical Study Using Naturalistic Driving Data

The time gap is defined as the time difference between the rear of a vehicle and the front of its follower, which affects both safety and the saturation flow rate of a roadway segment. In this study, naturalistic driving data were examined to measure time gaps from seven different drivers in a car-f...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Amara Loulizi, Youssef Bichiou, Hesham Rakha
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Wiley 2019-01-01
Series:Journal of Advanced Transportation
Online Access:http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2019/7659496
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1849397687222272000
author Amara Loulizi
Youssef Bichiou
Hesham Rakha
author_facet Amara Loulizi
Youssef Bichiou
Hesham Rakha
author_sort Amara Loulizi
collection DOAJ
description The time gap is defined as the time difference between the rear of a vehicle and the front of its follower, which affects both safety and the saturation flow rate of a roadway segment. In this study, naturalistic driving data were examined to measure time gaps from seven different drivers in a car-following scenario within steady-state conditions. The measurements were taken from a 13-km section of a Dulles Airport access road in Washington, DC. In total, 168,053 time gap samples were obtained covering seven speed intervals. Analysis of the data revealed a large variation in time gaps within individual drivers’ driving data, with coefficients of variation as high as 63.8% observed for some drivers. Results also showed that the variability within drivers was more significant at speeds higher than 54 km/h. In addition, there was a large variability between drivers. At speeds above 108 km/h, minimum time gaps left by some drivers could be 1.6 times longer than those left by others. Several statistical distributions were used to fit the data of the seven drivers as well as the data for all drivers combined for each speed interval. The selected distributions passed the goodness-of-fit (Kolmogorov-Smirnov, Chi-square, and Anderson-Darling) criteria only when the number of samples was reduced. Data reduction was not performed randomly, but rather in a manner intended to maintain the same observed distribution when all the samples were used. It is therefore recommended that empirical measures of distributions be used in traffic microsimulation software rather than theoretically fit distributions obtained based on statistical tests. This will lead to better naturalistic traffic behavior simulations, resulting in more precise predicted measures of performance (travel time, fuel consumption, and gas emissions).
format Article
id doaj-art-a89cb64a798047a1a69249abc3a8ddb2
institution Kabale University
issn 0197-6729
2042-3195
language English
publishDate 2019-01-01
publisher Wiley
record_format Article
series Journal of Advanced Transportation
spelling doaj-art-a89cb64a798047a1a69249abc3a8ddb22025-08-20T03:38:54ZengWileyJournal of Advanced Transportation0197-67292042-31952019-01-01201910.1155/2019/76594967659496Steady-State Car-Following Time Gaps: An Empirical Study Using Naturalistic Driving DataAmara Loulizi0Youssef Bichiou1Hesham Rakha2Civil Engineering Department, Université de Tunis El Manar, Ecole Nationale d’Ingénieurs de Tunis, 1002, TunisiaCenter for Sustainable Mobility, Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, 24061, USACenter for Sustainable Mobility, Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, 24061, USAThe time gap is defined as the time difference between the rear of a vehicle and the front of its follower, which affects both safety and the saturation flow rate of a roadway segment. In this study, naturalistic driving data were examined to measure time gaps from seven different drivers in a car-following scenario within steady-state conditions. The measurements were taken from a 13-km section of a Dulles Airport access road in Washington, DC. In total, 168,053 time gap samples were obtained covering seven speed intervals. Analysis of the data revealed a large variation in time gaps within individual drivers’ driving data, with coefficients of variation as high as 63.8% observed for some drivers. Results also showed that the variability within drivers was more significant at speeds higher than 54 km/h. In addition, there was a large variability between drivers. At speeds above 108 km/h, minimum time gaps left by some drivers could be 1.6 times longer than those left by others. Several statistical distributions were used to fit the data of the seven drivers as well as the data for all drivers combined for each speed interval. The selected distributions passed the goodness-of-fit (Kolmogorov-Smirnov, Chi-square, and Anderson-Darling) criteria only when the number of samples was reduced. Data reduction was not performed randomly, but rather in a manner intended to maintain the same observed distribution when all the samples were used. It is therefore recommended that empirical measures of distributions be used in traffic microsimulation software rather than theoretically fit distributions obtained based on statistical tests. This will lead to better naturalistic traffic behavior simulations, resulting in more precise predicted measures of performance (travel time, fuel consumption, and gas emissions).http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2019/7659496
spellingShingle Amara Loulizi
Youssef Bichiou
Hesham Rakha
Steady-State Car-Following Time Gaps: An Empirical Study Using Naturalistic Driving Data
Journal of Advanced Transportation
title Steady-State Car-Following Time Gaps: An Empirical Study Using Naturalistic Driving Data
title_full Steady-State Car-Following Time Gaps: An Empirical Study Using Naturalistic Driving Data
title_fullStr Steady-State Car-Following Time Gaps: An Empirical Study Using Naturalistic Driving Data
title_full_unstemmed Steady-State Car-Following Time Gaps: An Empirical Study Using Naturalistic Driving Data
title_short Steady-State Car-Following Time Gaps: An Empirical Study Using Naturalistic Driving Data
title_sort steady state car following time gaps an empirical study using naturalistic driving data
url http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2019/7659496
work_keys_str_mv AT amaraloulizi steadystatecarfollowingtimegapsanempiricalstudyusingnaturalisticdrivingdata
AT youssefbichiou steadystatecarfollowingtimegapsanempiricalstudyusingnaturalisticdrivingdata
AT heshamrakha steadystatecarfollowingtimegapsanempiricalstudyusingnaturalisticdrivingdata