Trajectory-Based Measurement of Signalized Intersection Capacity

Capacities of road intersections are a limiting factor and crucial for the performance of road networks. Therefore, for purposes of intersection design and of optimal signal timing, numerous methodologies have been proposed to either estimate or directly measure the capacity of single movements at road intersections. However, both model-based estimation and direct measurement suffer from the large effort that is needed to gather the relevant data. Even worse, once the data are collected they only represent a snapshot of the capacity over time. This paper proposes an alternative approach to estimate capacity of signalized road intersections over time using only automatically generated trajectories of probe vehicles. The obtained capacity can be used to evaluate the effective degree of saturation using real demand, or to assess hypothetic different conditions in demand or signaling. The cyclic operation of signalized intersections allows for the accumulation of trajectories, and thus in practical applications for the compensation of potentially low penetration rates. Within a sequential process the intersection’s cycle time and the approach green time and saturation flow rates are determined. The determination of the cycle time and the green times is based on an existing approach. The derivation of the saturation flow rates relies on its direct dependency to the saturation time headway and uses two parameters to be calibrated. Testing with a commercial dataset on an intersection in Munich produced a good signal timing estimation and saturation flow values that are comparable to a calculation based on the German guideline.