 Telematics Applications for Transport Library
 Document item |
|
 Title : |
TABASCO - TR 1054 - Final Report |
| Author : |
B. Friedrich; M. Clark; J. Mertz; O. Ernhofer; C. Toomey; T. McLean; B. Frayne; D. Lawrence; J. Parker |
| Ref. No : |
TR1054 D9.3 |
| Date : |
01/07/98 |
| Size : |
74 pages |
Exec Summary : |
Within the DRIVE II/ATT project LLAMD the network control method Balance, a pilot for adaptive signal control, was developed and evaluated. The new method optimises signal control considering needs of different user groups and in particular of public transport vehicles.
Based on these results, the partners Munich, Strathclyde, London, Lothian, Belfast and Bergamo decided to co-operate in TABaSco, validating and demonstrating advanced approaches for Urban Traffic Control with a particular emphasis on the requirements of different user groups. These user groups are on the one hand road users, i.e. pedestrians, public transport users and car traffic and on the other hand public transport and network operators.
The co-operative approach to specify and develop an advanced traffic signal control method under co-operation of different European partners lead to the definition of common user needs that are covering most of the requirements for a modern control system of urban networks.
According to these specifications the existing method Balance was enhanced in order
- to provide a flexible system architecture that allows extension the system in an evolutionary way and to minimise communication costs,
- to consider pt priority as an integral part of the modelling and optimisation process,
- to provide an adaptive local control method (different to va-technique) and
- to fit to the hardware of various European suppliers.
With respect to the mentioned requirements two derivatives of the original Balance, each of them focusing on special features, have been developed, tested and evaluated in TABASCO:
- Balance for Munich puts emphasis on the improvement of particular deficits which were investigated in the COMFORT field trials, i.e. the rescheduling of priorities amongst different competing public transport vehicles.
- Balance - UK focuses on the further development of a traffic adaptive microscopic component which was in the case of the original Balance substituted by the vehicle actuated component used by the city of Munich.
Balance has been tested in three sites: Munich, Glasgow and London. Another demonstrations planned for Belfast was delayed and will only be carried out after the TABASCO project will be finalised. All of the test sites represent typical urban main roads carrying heavy traffic loads and frequently operating in highly saturated conditions. All of them are further used by public transport vehicles, in Munich by a tramway line and different bus lines and in Glasgow, London and Belfast by bus lines. Some of the public transport lines can use segregated lanes (tramway in Munich, buses in Glasgow and Belfast), the others have to share the common road space with car traffic.
The general results of the technical and the impact assessment differ between the Munich application on the one side and the applications in Glasgow and London on the other side. In both UK sites, a completely new Balance prototype had to be implemented at junctions that had been equipped with completely different systems before, and because of this a number of problems arose, which could not been entirely sorted out during the lifetime of the project. In Munich, components of the current Balance version had been already tested at the same junction through a previous Balance prototype before TABASCO, and accordingly the Munich site was more mature regarding both the software and hardware used and therefore created no technical problems.
The performance of the field trials in London and Glasgow particularly suffered from the effect that in Balance an optimisation of cycle time did not work at this stage of demonstration, whereas the reference method MOVA provided this feature. Furthermore, it was found after the trials that the London system had consistently underestimated the number of vehicles in the main road, because the detectors could not pick up more than 1 car per direction per second.
However, at all sites the results of the impact analysis show a significant potential to improve performance compared with more traditional control methods. These trials are currently going on and will show with more detail and on a higher statistical level of confidence the level of improvement that can be gained using a modern approach.
Because of the promising results of the TABaSco demonstrations and because of the gained consensus concerning the usefulness of the system architecture all test sites are going on to either extend the network controlled by Balance (Munich) or to further test the method (London, Glasgow, Belfast). Therefore after the end of TABaSco a continuity for the further development and the deployment is given.
This deliverable consists of 1 volume : tabasco d9.3.pdf |
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