Category: Traffic

As the World Health Organization (WHO) reported, outdoor air pollution is such as “the main environmental risk for health”, linking it to 3.7 million premature deaths worldwide in 2012. It means that traffic congestion increases vehicle emissions and degrades ambient air quality. Lung cancer, asthma, other respiratory diseases associated with heart disease and stroke are impressions of traffic jams. According to a CNN report, a study by Washington University in St. Louis noted that “being exposed to the daily hassles of traffic can lead to higher chronic stress”. Further, evaluations of danger associated with congestion must consider travel time, the continuation of rush-hour, congestion-specific emission estimates, and uncertainties. Immediately, our understanding of the air pollution impacts from congestion on roads is very limited.

The majority of the number of studies has been done in order to discover the ways to reduce the people who do not have a habit of using public transport systems, encourage them to start using transportation and try to show them the benefits of this.

First of all, a common treatment for this issue is to upgrade the public transport such as bus, electric bicycle, electric motorbike, etc. it can be seen clearly that the government has recognized the importance of this point. As a result, they have promulgated laws or actions to deal with this problem. For example, Hanoi advocates simultaneously the agenda of limiting motorcycles will promote the development of public transport in both quality and quantity. HCM City has also studied the use of electric buses and boats and improved service quality on buses and bus infrastructure and has assigned a number of plans to increase the number of commuters using buses to 11.2 percent this year, up 1.6 percentage points from last year. The southern largest economic center has piloted electronic cards on nine crowded routes passing through universities.

Additionally, giving the users incentives should be an effective way. By offering the employees an intensive to make use of trains and buses, such as yearly travel cards, can encourage people to drive less and use public transport more. Car users or driven have to spend less money being used on car maintenance and fuel so that reduces air pollution.

Flexible start time also should be a good idea that we can consider. If you are thinking about how to boost the workforce using public transport regularly, it is a good idea to put in place flexible working hours too. For example, it can be clearly seen that from 7 am to 9 am, people pour into the street in order to go to school, go to the office, etc. causing traffic congestion. That way if any unforeseen circumstances arise, delays and cancellations to their scheduled route, working time does not have to be off is an example.

The next point is carsharing. This concept is quite new in Vietnam but very popular in developed countries like China, Korea, the USA, etc. it means that two more people can rent one car simultaneously for a short period of time, often by an hour to come to the same place and the price they have to pay will be share with each other. In this way, the number of vehicles and people using buses in the street can be reduced a lot. The result shows that this treatment has a boom in America in 2008 and increasing in Tokyo, Matxcova, Beijing these days.

Last, but not least, the most important thing in this program is to create a positive public transport office culture. There are a large number of ways to encourage people to start to use public transport but the main point is that educating people through materials and seminars, show them using transport is right and necessary for them. Besides, in the workplace, the manager can encourage people by setting office-wide sustainability goals like a competition.

I growed up in a city where there is no traffic. Every time I go to school, I travel four and a half kilometers in five to ten minutes only. I go to school fresh and arrive fresh with the same hairstyle, smell, and even my clothes are not tousled. The problem there is the foods that they will serve on the dinner table the next time and not the traffic.

I moved here last 2017 to continue my studies. That year was the start that I experienced traffic congestion that makes a traffic crisis and how it affects the behaviour and productivity of the person and the profit of those businesses. Those drivers become irate if they get into it, they make small things complicated. Passengers like employees and students become withered that makes them unproductive. And the supply of those businesses that they should deliver on time will arrive late and it causes loss of profit.

As defined by definitions.net Traffic congestions it is a condition on road networks that occurs as usage increases, and characterized by slower speeds and longer trip times and increases vehicular queueing. If this happen for a long period it may become a traffic jam and the effect of it is called ‘traffic crisis.’ This traffic crisis happened because of this congestion wherein you cannot ride any transportation vehicles because there are no movements on their way.

Traffic in our country is one of the major problems that we are facing today. Numbers of vehicles are increasing while the railroads, skyways, and subway is just stay the same. We know for the fact that Metro Manila is the center of business trading as well as you can find here the main branch of those giant businesses. Unlike other areas in the Philippines, like in Visayas and Mindanao where there is no severe traffic there. Which I think would be the focus to solve this traffic crisis. Many people proposed solutions to this problem which I think if combined will definitely give a better outcome to solve the problem.

As a result of the problem. The Philippines ranked 9th in countries with the worst traffic in the world and ranked 4th in Asia according to a report made by Numbeo, a Serbia-based research firm. Also, they mention that the average travel time for a one-way commute is about 45.50 minutes. Furthermore, the long commute in the country gave a dissatisfaction rate of 3,724.39 on the traffic index. The report implied how inefficient our traffic system is. This long time-of-travel is not good in all aspects especially in our health.

In times of this. It’s very hard to get stuck in traffic congestion and worst if there’s an emergency happening. Like there’s an Ambulance stuck in the traffic, so it’s very hard. Just to share a story with you everyone. This happened last December. Me and my friends: Trisha Rasonable, Kathe Villasis, waiting for a jeep going to Alabang from here (PLMun), suddenly there’s no jeep going there. So, what we did was we rode a jeep going to Bayan. From there, we wait for a jeep going to Alabang and yet there’s still no jeep. So, we decided to walk it until the Muntinlupa Municipality. From there, we ride a jeep going to Alabang, after five minutes we get stuck into traffic but it’s good because we are already in Lakewood. So, we walked it until Alabang. At that moment, you can see to us the exhausted effigy. So, we used the footbridge to go across. While we’re walking, we saw an Ambulance being stuck in the traffic and it’s rueful to see the situation wherein you cannot help the person inside that ambulance, but all you can do is to pray for the benefit of that person inside.

I blame those past Administration for not implementing any plans and for being greedy of their positions and power. However, I am glad that this administration or Duterte’s administration to specifically really carry out such thing that could help every Filipino to have a better lives like, Tax Reform for Acceleration Inclusion (TRAIN) Law that has a positive effects to our economy, and Bangsamoro Organic Law that show a political entity, that could help those Muslim Filipinos and all indigenous cultural communities in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Mindanao for meaningful self-governance. See, how this administration helped this country to build-up and uplift all Filipinos to have better lives.

Last year September, the administration ally Senator Francis Tolentino filed a Senate Bill 213, that seeks to grant such power to President Rodrigo Duterte. Under the 18th congress, at least three bills have filed for emergency powers. According to Tolintino, ‘This bill proposes to declare the existence of a national emergency in view of the traffic and congestion crisis in Metropolitan Manila, Metropolitan Cebu, and other highly urbanized cities … to authorize the President, for a limited period and subject to restrictions, to exercise powers necessary to effectively address the said national emergency.’

This Emergency Power is I think helpful to every Filipino. The czar could help to create a solution to this retrograde traffic problem. As the President’s alter-ego, the traffic czar authorized him to exercise all powers necessary, use all resources, exercise police power and eminent domain, and use executive actions and measures to solve the problem. In addition, Emergency powers would fast-track procurement, right-of-way acquisitions, and move processing so that priority infrastructure projects could start sooner than later and be raised at a faster pace to partial portability, (GMA News, September 2019). This czar could speed those projects of this administration until the Presidential Term. Because if the program is not yet done until his Presidential term there’s a possibility that the proposed scheme will stop by the next President or Administration and proposed another scheme to solve the problem. So, I am in favor of this czar and until now there’s still no update about this.

This traffic crisis could be solved only by looking at the cause of the problem first before putting any solutions. One step at a time could lessen the severe traffic and congestion. Everyone should coöperate for this is the benefit of everyone and this could help to solve the crisis in traffic and the country becomes a better place to live-in.

According to article about solution to solve the traffic congestion by Mr. Shladover. The traffic congestion can be solved with one system which integrated with wireless connection form each vehicle. The result of this system can give suggestion for route to prevent a crowded area, then every road can be more optimal. Calculation of best route from this system will be shown at application in each vehicle as assistant driver. Perhaps it is a great plan for future but for some years again this solution waste if will be applied. It will need long time and much fund to upgrade every vehicle to have this application. In the real life, we just can found little vehicle which have applied application as assistant driver. So, if just some vehicle which applied with this system, it can,t be work optimum. Technology has made our live easier, better and faster than before. As like Melanie’s quote, technology utilization on any sector offer huge improvement in our live (Melanie.2018). The development technology in this era can be utilized as a solution of traffic congestion based on

Shladover quote at his article published by CNN. Combination of two technology aspect, wireless connectivity and automation give some opportunities for solve this problem. Aside transportation, technology have been applied to any sector in life and give more advantage than before. The way to solve the traffic jam with technology application is a great idea to improve transportation in one area. If every vehicle on road capable use application to connect each others , it will make a one integrated automation system which can improve efficiency of highway lines. This system will analyse traffic on one area, then information of ideal route for each vehicle will be showed on vehicle application.

Application on each vehicle can anticipate traffic jam, show disturbances on the road and give suggestion the best route to driver so the vehicle can be safely driven than without this application. Connection automation transportation technology can improve commute travel conduction, improve cost-effectiveness and quality of public transportation. With the Shladover way, transportation system will be more integrated and each vehicle can eliminate annoyance on the road so traffic can be more effective and safely.

Great benefit of Shladover way to solve traffic congestion still has weakness which make this system still can’t applied in a large area, like a country. This automation system has one requirement, that is every vehicle use the application which connect on a integrated traffic system. Then, almost vehicle still didn’t has this application, especially in Indonesia. This system will work well if all the vehicle have this application, if not it will make the driver with automation system still have to adjust with non automation vehicle.

Beside that, the calculation of central system can’t effective one hundred percent because still many vehicle which not include in radar at integrated system. The obstacle to apply Shladover way to combat traffic jam is upgrade all vehicle with the application which connected each vehicle and connected with central system. Upgrade of each vehicle need long time and much budget for it. Not just one vehicle , but all vehicle in area which want to be applied. So, it will need a large budget to make this integrated system . This idea of automation is great plan to solve this problem for long time. For closed time, it still can’t work because still little vehicle which has the application of this system.

But, government can be apply this program step by step with upgrade every vehicle in one area. From the explanation above, we can conclude if Shladover way to combat traffic jam is not absolutely efficient for right now. It has been require long time to apply in real life. Not just time, this program also needs budget for upgrade every car on the area of program activation. With this way, transportation will more work well and can improve every road at the city to connect each destination. The road which rarely used by people will be shown as a good route by application to prevent crowded place.

So, with this program can decrease level of the traffic congestion. But, it still can,t be applied for tight now. Moreover, government should start to apply this automation program step by step like upgrade every new vehicle with this application. With the little move from the government rule, this automation program will be held not for long time again. Aside that, they have to offer other solution to solve the traffic jam, like odd even number vehicle or one way system on the road. Then, government must remember to always improve the facility on the road, not just about online network to set the traffic. The other best solution than the shladover way is make a public transport as primary transportation in the city (Buchanan, Mark. 2019). Public transportation is effective solution to decrease a volume of vehicle in the street which being factor of traffic jam happens.

With the increasing number of vehicles on the roads, motorways and highways, it has become necessary to manage the traffic congestion problem. According to some studies, we now manufacture more cars in a month than we used to in a year, a decade ago. The increasing number of vehicles have caused frequent road accidents leading to multiple causalities and losses to properties while also adding an additional pressure on the traffic management systems in the urban areas. According to the study conducted by Singh [1] on the investigation of different reasons of crashing, among the key factors or the causes of road accidents like vehicles, drivers, external environmental factors such as slick roads, weather, etc., failure of a vehicle’s component, the majority of the accidents (almost about 94%) occurred because of the driver. Among these 94% accidents, 41% were due to cognitive errors, 33% were due to the mistake in the decision-making process by the driver and 11% due to the improper operation. Therefore, a fully automated self-driving car that can replace human drivers has turned out as an important research subject in the future development in this domain.

The automated cars bring with themselves, a bundle of challenges to overcome as well. For example, harsh weather like heavy rains interferes with the sensors and that could trigger accidents. Another reason that self-driving is still not on roads is because of shortage of the amount of training data available for the machine learning algorithms to learn from. Self-driving cars are powered by machine learning algorithms which are hungry for data. They learn from thousands of hours of data of different real-world scenarios on the roads and without it they are practically useless. There are various ethical issues associated with self-driving cars as well like the well-known ’Trolley Problem’ which will require the program or AI (artificial intelligence) driving the car to take a decision involving ethical dilemma of whether to sacrifice one person to save many [2].

Even though we have a long way to go for having fully automated cars on the road, we have made tremendous progress in tackling the traffic congestion problems on the road. We can now simulate various aspects of the real-world driving scenarios on roads and highways through different simulation software which can aid us greatly in solving various traffic congestion problems and also reduce (if not completely avoid) road accidents. One such real world scenario is the merging of lanes on a road or a motorway to reduce congestion.

A team of researchers at Trinity College Dublin (TCD) conducted a study in which they designed an algorithm al- lowing partially or fully automated vehicles to self-organize and alleviate the effects of lane merging [3]. They called this motorway, the” Self-Organizing Motorway”. Self-organization can be thought of as a process in which the elements in a system interact on their own and optimize their behaviour over time without any external authority imposing it. This same self-organising nature can be seen in traffic control management at intersections to avoid the traffic jam problems [4]. The simulation software used in the motorway study is called VISSIM. The team at trinity developed a multi-modal simulation of traffic flow in a scenario in which a three lane motorway merges into two lanes after a distance of 2km. The primary objective of this study is to replicate different aspects of the Self-organising Motorway research considering real world scenarios, using the discrete event simulation python package known as Simpy. This study will focus on creating separate models for simulating different scenarios in a two-lane motorway. These scenarios will also incorporate the erratic behaviour of the human drivers using different distributions for speeds and by also introducing the lane selection function which allows an entering vehicle to choose between the two lanes at random. But since we are considering a real-world scenario, we have given specific weights to each lane depending on the lane nature(slowfast). Different simulation models will be constructed for each of scenarios and the results (throughput, average travelling time, average speed and traffic density) are reported. These models will be discussed in the section IV. The results obtained and their interpretations will be summarized in section IV.

Consequences of Violating Traffic Laws

Road Traffic Accidents (RTAs) or crashes can be defined as accidents involving at least one vehicle on a road open to public traffic in which at least one person, pedestrian, driver, or road user is killed or injured.

Road safety measures can be defined as the methods and measures used to prevent users from being killed or injured while using the road (G.N. Maina and I.N.W. Towey, 2020).

Safety, according to The Highway Safety Manual (HSM), is defined as the crash frequency and crash severity, and collision type for a specific time period, a given location, and a given set of geometric and operational conditions (AASHTO, 2010). According to the Global Status report on road safety 2018 by the World Health Organization (WHO), fatalities emanating from road accidents have increased to 1.3 million per year. Of those killed, the majority are pedestrians, motorcyclists, and cyclists who often are vulnerable road users. A report by the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA, 2020) shows that road crashes claimed the lives of 3114 persons as of 31st October 2020 compared to a similar period in 2019 where 2942 lives were lost.

To understand road safety, one must understand crashes. Crashes are used in the evaluation of roadway safety. Characteristics of crashes such as crash severity and crash frequency must be well understood as they form an essential part of evaluating the safety of roadway facilities.

This section, therefore, reviews the causes of crashes, prevention methods that can be used, rates of crashes, crash severity, and crash frequency.

Causes of traffic crashes

• Causes of road traffic accidents can be divided into; General causes and Specific causes (Ansari, 2000). The general causes include;
• Increased number of expatriates from different countries who are not familiar with the local driving conditions and requirements.
• A large increase in vehicle capacity and road expansions within and between the cities.
• Large development projects require the development of supporting transport systems. (M.B Ratemo, 2015)

Studies show that drivers ignore traffic laws (Odero et al., 2003; WHO, 2004) and pedestrians routinely walk in the middle of the streets and cross without checking for traffic or traffic signals. it is however noted that law violations and errors by drivers are in the lead with more than 90% of all highway accidents arising from this. In developing countries, drivers develop dangerous habits and their observation of traffic regulations is poor (Pludemmann et al., 2004; Gururaj, 2004).

There are three categories of factors that contribute to crashes (AASHTO, 2010): Human factors, Vehicle, and Roadway factors. The main cause of RTAs and crashes is due to human errors. Some of the common human behaviors that lead to accidents in Kenya are;

Over-speeding – an increase in driving speed by drivers multiplies the risk of an accident occurring and the severity of the injuries that emerge from such accidents. The ability of the driver to judge properly the forthcoming events gets reduced which leads to errors and final crashes with high impacts therefore more injuries. The higher the vehicle speed, the higher the risk of accidents and the severity of injuries.

Red light jumping – the main reason for red light jumping is to save time. In Kenya, it is common in some places for drivers to cross without caring about the traffic lights at intersections.

Distraction to drivers – the major distraction to drivers nowadays is talking on phones while driving. Some other destructions include; radio music in vehicles, banners, and advertisements on the roadsides, adjusting mirrors while driving, etc.

Drunken driving – alcohol reduces the concentration level of humans and their reaction times as well as hampering the vision of the user, and driver. It also incites a person to take unnecessary risks such as speeding and overtaking among others, all of which can result in road accidents.

Roadway and environmental factors that lead to road traffic accidents include; merging roads, potholes, illegal speed breakers, damaged roads, diversions, heavy rainfall, snow, fog, and storms.

Vehicle factors include tire bursts, overloading, wide and projecting loads, long vehicles, failure of breaks, insufficient or no headlights, etc.

The Handbook of Road Safety Measures provides valuable insight into understanding the concept of crash causes. The Handbook states ‘the logic of the argument that you need to know the causes of a problem in order to solve it seems irresistible. Therefore, the complexity of known and unknown contributing factors can be overcome through the development and use of proper statistical tools that correctly model behaviors and characteristics of crashes.

Intervention measures

The key to safe road infrastructure design is the consistency of standards so that road users do not encounter unexpected situations. In Kenya, several road safety policies and interventions have been implemented. The purpose of these policies is to assist all Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs) in developing and implementing effective road safety policies to promote safety on roads and prevent and manage road crashes and fatalities in Kenya.

There are three broad categories of interventions (M. Gupta et al, B. Souvik, 2020)

1. Road Engineering; these are preventive measures involving engineering changes to road design that affect road users. These interventions include changes in intersections, segregation of non-motorized road users from motorized vehicles, and reduction in vehicle speed, maintenance, and improvement of existing road infrastructure to enhance road safety.
2. Enforcement of traffic laws; refers to setting up road safety rules and ensuring compliance from road users through legal enforcement. In Kenya, such enforcements include, traffic signal regulations, stop signs, speed limits, cameras, speed zones, mandatory helmet laws, etc.
3. Combination of Road Engineering, Regulatory and Legislative Interventions; these interventions include road markings involving specific road changes at junctions and intersections, bus rapid transit system, speed limit enforcement and speed reduction measures.

There are three main types of countermeasure implementation approaches according to Federal Highway Administration (FHWA):

1. Systematic Approach-The basis for the systematic approach is not on specific crash locations, but on crash types and proven low-cost safety countermeasures.
2. Spot Location Approach- The approach has typically been based on an analysis of crash location history. It could be applied to those locations that have had low-cost countermeasures installed systematically, but continue to show a higher-than-average crash rate.
3. Comprehensive Approach- The approach introduces the concept of the ‘4 E’s of Safety’: Engineering; Enforcement; Education; and Emergency Medical Services. This approach recognizes that not all locations can be addressed solely by infrastructure improvements.

According to the NTSA Edition II report on road safety policy guidelines for government Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs) in Kenya to support road safety mainstreaming in 2020, some of the road safety policies put in place include;

Road safety education and public awareness; to improve road safety knowledge and awareness amongst the general public through media, print, TV, etc.

Youth empowerment policy targeting Boda Boda riders; to offer support to the Boda Boda transport sector by sponsoring rider pieces of training and public awareness campaigns.

Training transporters on compliance with safety regulations; to increase knowledge of road safety. This is achieved by conducting periodic safety audits on compliance with their internal road safety.

Road Safety Audits; to improve road safety on all roads around the country through the implementation of rad audits reports, assessments on existing roads, and audits on road designs.

Safe Road PPE standards Policies; to enhance the safety of all road safety Personal Protective Equipment (PPEs) that enter the country, used by motorists, and passengers. Such activities include the development and implementation of Vehicle Safety Standards Programs. (Source – NTSA, Edition II, 2020)

Crash Rates

Crash rate analysis takes into account the exposure data in form of traffic volumes, normally expressed in Average Annual Daily Traffic (AADT) or roadway mileage, and is calculated to determine relative safety compared to other similar roadways, intersections, or segments.

Although the crash rate method is simple to use in assessing the safety of a location, it also has some shortcomings. The method is biased towards low-volume sites and requires volume data that are not easy to obtain, the severity of the accidents is not considered and regression to the mean is not addressed. The method also assumes that the frequency of crashes and traffic volumes have a linear relationship (AASHTO).

The method improves upon the average crash frequency in that it normalizes the frequency of the crashes with the exposure, as measured in traffic. It, therefore, provides an improved yardstick for comparison between sites or locations of the roadway.

The general relationship between crash frequency and crash rates can be given by the following equation (Roess, 2004).

Crash rate =Total Crash FrequencyAverage Exposure Equation 2.1

To calculate the crash rate of a roadway segment, the following formula is used (AASHTO);

R=A -1000000L -V-365 Equation 2.2

Where:

• R – Crash Rate expressed in crashes per Million Vehicle Miles Traveled (MVMT).
• V – Average Daily Traffic Volume along the roadway.
• L – Length of the roadway segment in miles.
• A – Average number of crashes along the study roadway per year.

To calculate the crash rate of a roadway intersection, the following formula is used (AASHTO);

R=A -1000000V -365 Equation 2.3

Where:

• R – Crash Rate expressed as crashes per Million Entering Vehicles (MEV).
• A – Average number of crashes at the study location per year.
• V – Intersection ADT (total daily approach volume).

(Source – http:www.crpc-la.org)

Crash Frequency

Crash frequency analysis is one of the simplest forms of crash data analysis and can be defined as the number of crashes occurring within a specific jurisdiction, on a roadway segment, or at an intersection of the roads over a given period, typically three to five years, as described in the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). Crash frequency is an attractive quantitative screening technique because the only data required are crashes and their physical locations where they occurred. Other data like traffic volume and roadway features are not necessarily required, therefore making it relatively quick and easy to use.

However, the method does have shortcomings. The method does not take traffic volumes into account as higher volume locations are likely to have more crashes than lower volume locations, therefore an intrinsic bias toward higher volume locations. It also does not account for the natural variation in crash frequency that occurs at any given site while on an annual basis, the number of crashes at a site will fluctuate up and down. Regression to the mean – the tendency for a site to experience a period with a comparatively high crash frequency followed by a period with comparatively low crash frequency – must also be accounted for.

References

1. Gichaga, F. J. The Impact of road improvements on road safety and related characteristics. Retrieved February 20, 2021, from. https:doi.org10.1016j.iatssr.2016.05.002.
2. Manyara C.G. (2016) Combating Road Traffic Accidents in Kenya: A Challenge for an Emerging Economy. In: Koster M.M., Kithinji M.M., Rotich J.P. (eds) Kenya After 50. African Histories and Modernities. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https:doi.org10.10579781137574633_7.