Determination of non-recurring traffic bottlenecks caused by accidents using open data: Case Study of Sayyad Shirazi Highway, Tehran, Iran

According to FHWA investigations, approximately 5 percent of traffic congestions are the consequences of incidents on routes. This category is considered as non-recurring bottlenecks. The major importance of this group is because of the high probability of injury or fatal accidents. Since in developing nations, there are insufficient financial resources to traffic safety, injured individuals should be considered as superiorities. The minor concern is to prevent bottlenecks from spreading to adjacent routes, reduce travel times, improve routes’ level of service, and reduce air pollution. The first step toward these types of bottlenecks is to quickly identify them. Utilizing open data, available through cell phones, is an effective solution to this issue. In this study, applying Waze data and analyzing time series, the location, activation time, and the severity of these bottlenecks were determined on Sayyad Shirazi highway in Tehran. The determination of the above-mentioned characteristics of the bottlenecks assists organizations to manage congestions. The innovation of this study is utilizing Waze open data to locate non-recurring bottlenecks to rescue injured people.

Keywords:

Non-recurring bottleneck , Time series , Online traffic flow control , ITS , Probe data