Identify Best Locations for New Flex-Route Projects Throughout the State of Michigan

Details

• Creators:
  Savolainen, Peter T. ; Gates, Timothy J. ; Gupta, Nischal ; Abatan, Akinfolarin ; Hill, Matthew ; Ceifetz, Andrew H. ; Zockaie, Ali ; Kamjoo, Ehsan ; Ghamami, Mehrnaz
• Corporate Creators:
  Michigan State University. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
• Corporate Contributors:
  Michigan Department of Transportation ; United States. Department of Transportation. Federal Highway Administration
• Subject/TRT Terms:
  Congestion Management Systems Construction Projects Location Managed Lanes Transportation Planning
• Publication/ Report Number:
  SPR-1751
• Resource Type:
  Tech Report
• Geographical Coverage:
  Michigan ; United States
• Edition:
  Final Report, 6/14/2023 - 6/14/2025
• Corporate Publisher:
  Michigan Department of Transportation. Research Administration
• Abstract:
  Part-time shoulder use (PTSU) has emerged as an effective lane-use strategy to mitigate both recurrent and non-recurrent congestion. Given the operational and safety benefits associated with the US-23 Flex Route, this research project focused on evaluating the feasibility of PTSU on selected freeway corridors in Michigan that are prone to such congestion. An initial list of 16 candidate freeway corridors was identified based on a review of congestion patterns and consultation with the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT). A series of comprehensive operational and safety assessments were conducted for these corridors. Delay trend maps were developed to visualize congestion patterns, and a macroscopic operational analysis was performed using the Highway Capacity Software (HSCS) Freeway Module to forecast the impacts of implementing PTSU on various operational measures of effectiveness. Results indicated that PTSU generally improved travel times and reduced vehicular delay and associated costs. Similar analyses were conducted to quantify the level of safety performance in terms of congestion-related crashes along these same corridors. A spreadsheet tool was developed to compare these performance measures across corridors. The performance measures were normalized, and an overall ranking score was assigned to prioritize candidate corridors for future PTSU implementation. The findings from this study provide a data-driven framework for identifying freeway corridors best suited for PTSU, enabling MDOT to make informed decisions for future implementation.
• Format:
  PDF
• Funding:
  2023-0458
• Collection(s):
  US Transportation Collection
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:3ca06e0757ffe108857571677801788cb47d5e7a4fd71c3507f2fe39c1d797bb1dd7b54b1c54dcce4c0c8b7d47f48ca77de91a18823b7a9dab6fca0811030771
• Download URL:
  https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/85296/dot_85296_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 7.68 MB ]