PURPOSES : Arterial work zones, particularly at signalized intersections, have several characteristics and effects different from freeways. This paper presents three significant work zone effects on signalized intersections: (1) saturation headway change (saturation flow rate change), (2) green time (g/C ratio) change, and (3) progression speed degradation impacts on bandwidth performance.
METHODS : Both saturation flow rate reduction and g/C reduction were selected as the work zone impact variables for a signalized intersection, while bandwidth capacity reduction was chosen to measure the impact of work zones on arterials. The authors established a statistical model and normalized g/C table to estimate saturation headways and the g/C ratio at signalized intersection work zones based on the work intensity, pavement condition, ledge presence, turn percentages from shared lanes, and number of closed exclusive turn lanes. In addition, the dynamic bandwidth capacity and bandwidth solution space change based on the progression speed were introduced in this study.
RESULTS : A normalized g/C ratio distribution was developed to estimate both the non-work zone and work zone g/C ratios under different work zone configurations. The results of the estimated work zone capacity using the work zone saturation headway model and the g/C ratio distribution showed that the estimated capacity reduction ranged from 32.78%~2.93%. In addition, arterial dynamic bandwidth and its capacity were both critically influenced by the progression speed.
CONCLUSIONS : The proposed model and method will help practitioners understand the factors that cause a decrease in the saturation flow rate and g/C and influence progression quality on the urban arterial street due to work zones. Moreover, the proposed model and method can guide the calibration of simulation tools to properly represent the resulting capacity effects of work zones on arterial streets.