Traffic safety and mobility of roadway work zones have been considered tobe one of the major concerns in highway traffic safety and operations in Florida. Dynamic lane merging (DLM) systems ITS-based lane management technology -- were introduced by several states in an attempt to enhance both safety and mobility of roadway work zones. Two forms of lane merging namely the early merge and the late merge were designed to advise drivers on definite merging locations. Up to date there are no studies that contrast both merging schemes under matching work zone settings. This study simulates a two-to-one work zone lane closure configuration in VISSIM under threedifferent Maintenance of Traffic (MOT) plans. The first MOT consisted of the conventional plans used in Florida work zones, the second MOT consisted of a simplified dynamic early merging system (early SDLMS), the third MOT consisted of a simplified dynamic late merging systems (late SDLMS). Field data were used to calibrate and validate the simulation models. Resultsindicated that in general, under different levels of drivers compliance rate and different percentages of tracks in the traffic composition, the early SLDMS outperformed the conventional MOT and the late SDLMS in terms of travel times and throughputs.
Abstract