GIS has for a number of years been used for data management and traffic monitoring. However, to the traffic planner it is equally important to be able to model the future traffic and environmental impacts of different strategies for urban development. Such models have only to a limited extent been implemented in GIS, and often only for specific purposes such as traffic models or noise models. This paper presents the methodical framework for a GIS for the whole traffic planning process (GIS-T) at the municipal level involving data collection, estimation of future traffic flows and environmental impacts of alternate solutions and decision support. An integrated GIS-T will not only ease the specific work, but also integrate and strengthen the process of traffic planning. As an example the evaluation and quality control of data and results can be improved. Also, the decision support can be strengthened, since different types of impacts can be presented in a coherent way. Special considerations when using GIS in municipalities are discussed, and experiences with a GIS-T implemented in the ARC/INFO software package are presented. Issues addressed are traffic models, models for traffic safety, noise, emissions, severance, land use, traffic economy and decision support.
Abstract