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The aim of this study is to analyze the influence of horizontal geometric design and vehicle operation on fuel consumption and gas emissions produced by passenger cars. Continuous speed data were collected along 15 two-lane rural road sections. Different horizontal alignment indexes and operational variables were obtained. Fuel consumption and gas emissions were estimated by applying the VT-Micro model. The results showed that Curvature Change Rate and average speed have a significant impact on average fuel consumption and gas emissions. Finally, different regression models were calibrated based on these variables to estimate fuel consumption [l/100 km] and emissions [gr/km]. These results could be the basis to incorporate environmental sustainability principles into road design guidelines, since currently they do not take into account the environmental impact related to highway geometric design.

[EN] Road crashes are mainly caused by three concurrent factors: infrastructure, vehicle, and human factors. The interaction between the infrastructure and human factors leads to the concept of geometric design consistency. Recently, a global consistency model was developed based on the difference between the inertial operating speed profile and the operating speed profile. The first was defined as the weighted average operating speed of the previous road section based on distance, and represents drivers¿ expectancies, whereas the second represents road behavior. However, drivers¿ expectancies are related to short-term memory which declines gradually and depends on time. Thus, a time-based inertial operating speed would allow a more accurate estimation of the phenomenon. This research analyzes different periods of time and weighting distributions to identify how drivers¿ expectancies should be estimated. A set of 71 homogeneous road segments located in Italy were considered in the study. As a result, 25 seconds and a convex parabolic distribution should be used to calculate the inertial operating speed profile. This new way of estimating drivers¿ expectancies showed better results than those obtained based on distance. Finally, the proposed consistency model was compared with the previous models and was found to be able to assess more accurately the geometric design consistency. Therefore, the proposed consistency model is a useful tool for engineers to estimate the number of crashes so that they can incorporate road safety considerations into the geometric design of either new two-lane rural roads, or improving the existing ones., This research was subsidized by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry, and Competitiveness through ‘‘Ayudas a la movilidad predoctoral para la realizacio´n de estancias breves en centros de I+ D 2015.’’ The study presented in this paper is also part of the research project entitled ‘‘CASEFU - Estudio experimental de la funcionalidad y seguridad de las carreteras convencionales’’ (TRA2013-42578-P), subsidized by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry, and Competitiveness and the European Social Fund. In addition, the authors would like to thank the ‘‘Azienda Nazionale Autonoma delle Strade’’ (ANAS) and the ‘‘Automobile Club Italia’’ (ACI), who provided traffic and crash data, respectively

[EN] Road crash occurrence is closely related to the geometric design consistency, which can be defined as how drivers¿ expectancies and road behavior fit. To this regard, the crash rate on a road segment increases as its consistency level decreases. To assess this phenomenon, inertial consistency models were recently developed. These models are based on the difference between the inertial operating speed, which represents drivers¿ expectancies, and the operating speed, which represents road behavior. The higher the difference between both speeds, the higher the likelihood of crash occurrence. This research aims to validate and calibrate these consistency models on American two-lane rural roads. For this, a total of 194 homogeneous road segments and 977 horizontal curves along 665 km in North Carolina (US) were used. As a result, the geometric design consistency was identified as a major factor of crash occurrence. The higher the difference between drivers¿ expectancies and road behavior, the higher the crash rate. Likewise, the greater the consistency level, the greater the percentage of horizontal curves without reported crashes. A Safety Performance Function was also calibrated to estimate the number of crashes on a road segment. Consistency thresholds were defined and tested to identify where these crashes are more likely to take place. Finally, the results obtained in this study were compared with those obtained previously on Spanish highways. To this regard, the crash rate on an American highway was 1.85 times greater than those observed on a Spanish highway under the same risk exposure and consistency conditions. Therefore, different tools were developed to enhance the assessment of road safety to the geometric design of both new two-lane rural roads and improvements of existing highways., This research was subsidized by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry, and Competitiveness through “Ayudas a la movilidad predoctoral para la realización de estancias breves en centros de I+D 2017” (EEBB-I-17-12154). The study presented in this paper is also part of the research project titled “CASEFU - Estudio experimental de la funcionalidad y seguridad de las carreteras convencionales” (TRA2013-42578-P), subsidized by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry, and Competitiveness and the European Social Fund. In addition, the authors would like to thank the North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT), which provided traffic and crash data.

[EN] Free-flow speed variation of passenger vehicles along a road segment is one of the most used factors in road safety studies, as a surrogate measure to evaluate road design consistency. Free-flow speed may be measured when a road segment is already built but must be estimated during the design phase. Several studies have been carried out to calibrate models to estimate free-flow speed, with geometric features as explanatory variables. Currently, most free-flow speed models focus only on mean speed or speed in particular percentiles, such as the 85th or 95th. Moreover, most studies have assumed normality in the free-flow speed distribution without checking this hypothesis. The main objective of this study was to analyze the free-flow speed distribution on two-lane rural road curves and tangents. The research focused on two main issues: determining whether speed data were normally distributed at a specific site and analyzing the behavior of the mean and standard deviation of speed on curves and tangents. The study was based on continuous operating speed profiles, which were obtained from a database of more than 16,000 vehicles/km. A total of 63 horizontal curves and 78 tangents were analyzed. According to the results, the normal distribution is not the best distribution in most cases for describing free-flow speeds. In 46 of the curves and 64 of the tangents, free-flow speed cannot be assumed to be normally distributed. Therefore, some other distributions should be tested in further research., The study presented in this paper is part of the research project CASEFU-Estudio experimental de la funcionalidad y seguridad de las carreteras convencionales, subsidized by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness and the European Social Fund. In addition, the authors thank the Center for Studies and Experimentation of Public Works of the Spanish Ministry of Public Works for subsidizing the field data collection, and the Infrastructure and Transportation Department of the General Directorate of Public Works of the Valencian Government, the Valencian Provincial Council, and the Ministry of the Interior, especially the General Directorate of Traffic of Spain, for their cooperation in gathering the field data.

La inserción del Sistema Jurídico Mexicano de los Derechos Humanos trae aparejado el compromiso de armonizar las leyes locales con los diversos instrumentos internacionales dictados en esa materia. No obstante, pese al esfuerzo legislativo en el tema de las víctimas de un delito, las normas mexicanas se han quedado cortas en cuanto al espectro que comprende dicha figura jurídica. Dentro de la investigación realizada se ha comprobado que la norma no ha considerado como víctimas a las personas inculpadas pero absueltas en procesos jurisdiccionales donde el ofendido es el Estado. También se comprobó que hay víctimas que sin ser ofendido o inculpado, sufren las consecuencias derivadas de esos procesos judiciales. Estas omisiones traen como consecuencia que esas víctimas definidas en el presente artículo como subyacente y por ofensa, vean lesionada su esfera jurídica y sean atropelladas en sus derechos.

A new method for fitting the horizontal alignment of a road to a set of (x, y) points is proposed in this article. The proposed method describes the horizontal alignment as a sequence of headings unlike current methods that represent road alignment through curvature.These points are obtained from digital imagery or global positioning system (GPS)-data collection. An analytic-heuristic approach is introduced and the proposed method produces unique solutions for complex horizontal alignments. Researchers and departments of transportation could obtain accurate geometric features using the solution. However, the solution may not be accurate enough for road redesign. The article presented case studies using the method.

[EN] The most important factors for road crash occurrence are infrastructure, vehicle, and human factors. In fact, infrastructure and its interaction with human factor have been thoroughly studied in recent years through geometric design consistency, which can be defined as how drivers¿ expectations and road behavior relate. Global consistency models were calibrated in the last decade to assess road safety on an entire homogeneous road segment. However, none of them include the underlying consistency phenomenon in their formulation. Recently, a new model was developed based on the difference between the inertial operating speed profile, which represents drivers¿ expectancies, and the operating speed profile, which represents road behavior. While the operating speed represents the estimated operating speed for every location along the road, the inertial operating speed aggregates for every station the operating speed effect along some distance already covered by drivers. The authors hypothesized that this `aggregation effect¿ was connected to drivers¿ expectancies, which proved to be true based on the best model fitted. However, the exact distance (or time) that should be considered to estimate the inertial operating speed still remains unknown. This paper aims to complete this model, analyzing how the inertial operating speed varies depending on different distances and periods of time. This impact is measured considering the reliability of the corresponding consistency model. The paper also covers how the inertial operating speed should be determined along the final distance or time. For this, a total of 184 homogeneous road segments along 650¿km in Spain were used., The study presented in this paper is part of the research project titled "CASEFU - Estudio experimental de la funcionalidad y seguridad de las carreteras convencionales" (TRA2013-42578-P), subsidized by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness and the European Social Fund. In addition, the authors would like to thank the Department of Housing, Public Works and Spatial Planning of the Valencian Regional Government and the Traffic Department of the Spanish Government, which provided traffic and crash data, respectively.

Drivers' road perception is an important human factor of comfort and safety on driving. Available sight distance of crest vertical curves superimposed on horizontal curves can be geometrically optimised by applying 3D coordination criteria. However, drivers might not perceive available sight distance improvements. Two approaches were used to investigate the effect of geometrical optimised design on perceived sharpness and visibility of isolated crest vertical curves overlapped with horizontal curves. A survey-based approach was used to evaluate subjective perception of 100 drivers. Three-dimensional renderings were displayed to subjects; who were asked to rank the curves by sharpness and sight distance. Moreover, 50 of those drivers previously participated on a driving simulation experiment involving the same curves, so objective driving data were collected too. Drivers' survey results indicate that driver's curve perception depends on the algebraic difference of grades while coordination of vertical and horizontal curves does not appear to affect this perception. On the other hand, the operating speeds on different curves were not statistically different from each other. Surprisingly, the operating speeds on a flat curve tended to be lower than on the vertical crest curves superimposed on the same horizontal curve. Likely causes are discussed in the paper.

[ES] La velocidad de operación es uno de los factores más estudiados en el análisis de la seguridad vial por su relación con la siniestralidad. En la fase de explotación es relativamente sencillo calcular la velocidad de operación a partir de datos empíricos, pero, en las fases de planeamiento y de proyecto, sólo será posible estimarla. Numerosos autores han modelizado la velocidad de operación de vehículos ligeros en curvas de carreteras convencionales considerando su velocidad mínima. Algunos a partir de observaciones en aquellos puntos de la carretera más significativos como el punto medio de la curva (velocidad mínima), otros a partir de datos continuos utilizando, por ejemplo, dispositivos GPS. La mayoría de los modelos que estiman esta velocidad se basan únicamente en el percentil 85 de la distribución o en su velocidad media. Además, la mayoría de los estudios asumen que sus datos se distribuyen según una normal sin, en muchos casos, comprobar dicha hipótesis. El objetivo de este estudio es analizar la distribución de la velocidad desarrollada por vehículos ligeros circulando en condiciones de flujo libre en curvas de carreteras convencionales. Para ello, la investigación se basa en determinar si los datos de velocidad de 63 curvas disponibles de una base de más de 16.000 vh·km se distribuyen según una normal, y en el análisis del comportamiento de la media y la desviación típica de la distribución de velocidades en curvas. Se ha concluido que la distribución normal no es la que mejor se ajusta al comportamiento de la velocidad en la mayoría de los casos., El estudio que se ha presentado es parte del proyecto de investigación “CASEFU – Estudio experimental de la funcionalidad y seguridad de las carreteras convencionales” (TRA2013- 42578-P), subvencionado por el Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad y el Fondo Social Europeo. Asimismo, los autores quieren agradecer al Centro de Estudios y Experimentación de Obras Públicas (CEDEX) del Ministerio de Fomento por subvencionar la investigación en la que se llevó a cabo la toma de datos, a la Dirección General de Obras Públicas, Transporte y Movilidad de la Conselleria de Vivienda, Obras Públicas y Vertebración del Territorio, a la Diputación de Valencia, y al Ministerio del Interior, especialmente a la Dirección General de Tráfico, por su colaboración en la toma de datos.

[EN] To assist in the on-going effort to reduce road fatalities as much as possible, this paper presents a new methodology to evaluate road safety in both the design and redesign stages of two-lane rural highways. This methodology is based on the analysis of road geometric design consistency, a value which will be a surrogate measure of the safety level of the two-lane rural road segment. The consistency model presented in this paper is based on the consideration of continuous operating speed profiles. The models used for their construction were obtained by using an innovative GPS-data collection method that is based on continuous operating speed profiles recorded from individual drivers. This new methodology allowed the researchers to observe the actual behavior of drivers and to develop more accurate operating speed models than was previously possible with spot-speed data collection, thereby enabling a more accurate approximation to the real phenomenon and thus a better consistency measurement. Operating speed profiles were built for 33 Spanish two-lane rural road segments, and several consistency measurements based on the global and local operating speed were checked. The final consistency model takes into account not only the global dispersion of the operating speed, but also some indexes that consider both local speed decelerations and speeds over posted speeds as well. For the development of the consistency model, the crash frequency for each study site was considered, which allowed estimating the number of crashes on a road segment by means of the calculation of its geometric design consistency. Consequently, the presented consistency evaluation method is a promising innovative tool that can be used as a surrogate measure to estimate the safety of a road segment., The authors would like to thank the Center for Studies and Experimentation of Public Works (CEDEX) of the Spanish Ministry of PublicWorks for partially subsidizing this research.We also wish to thank the Infrastructure and Transportation Department of the General Directorate of Public Works of the Valencian Government, to the Valencian Provincial Council, and to the Ministry of the Interior, especially the General Directorate of Traffic of Spain, for their cooperation in field data gathering.