Studying the vehicle headway issue and its impact on the slow-down effect.
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2009-06-01
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Abstract:Tailgating is a dangerous driving behavior and is a major cause of rear-ended crashes. Finding effective means to help drivers maintain proper vehicle headways and to warn and discourage tailgating behavior is thus of utmost importance to traffic management authorities. This project presented a human-factors study, consisting of a vehicle headway analysis and a questionnaire survey, which was aimed to identify the causes of tailgating and to find effective means for tailgating treatments. In the vehicle headway analysis, vehicle headways on specific segments of major highways in Rhode Island were examined. With tailgating phenomenon confirmed from the analysis, the study next searched means to mitigate tailgating behavior. A questionnaire survey was conducted to find the leading causes of tailgating. Drivers’ preferences on several tailgating treatments were surveyed. The results of the survey indicated that the majority considered “tailgating” a serious offense. Most of them, however, did not know what the proper vehicle headway was when driving on highways. Among the few different tailgating treatments, most preferred the one where equal-distanced horizontal bars were used as reference markings. They also indicated that properly designed dynamic message signs and fixed signs using both graphics and words could help them better understand the proposed tailgating treatment systems.
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