Development of a road traffic noise prediction model under interrupted traffic flow conditions using the shock wave traffic flow theory.

The paper concentrates on the development of an appropriate model for predicting the time averaged traffic noise level Leq db(A) under interrupted flow traffic conditions. Starting with an under-capacity signalised intersection, the aim of the model is to relate the time averaged noise level Leq db(A) to the vehicles' operating times in the four modes of acceleration, deceleration, cruising, and queuing as calculated from shock wave traffic flow theory. The paper illustrates the new modelling approach in two main stages; the source noise level stage and the propagation stage to predict the noise level at different receiver positions. It also assesses the prediction accuracy of the model against the UK CRTN,88 method. (A)