Abstract

utomated Driving (AD) technology is anticipated to be a key aspect for achieving a higher level of road safety, a further reduction of harmful emissions, improving traffic flow, increasing comfort and ensuring mobility for all, including elderly and impaired. As AD technology is rapidly being developed, an increasing number of driving tasks in vehicles is currently being taken over by automation in Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS). With the transition towards Connected and Automated Driving (CAD), automation is expected to further increase until the driver is completely out of the driving loop. An important aspect in this continuous development is the safety assessment of the road worthiness of these new functions and systems.

Abstract

It is well known from the literature that road lighting has significant safety benefits. The NZTA Economic Evaluation Manual (EEM) quotes a 35% reduction in crashes as the effect of upgrading or improving lighting where lighting is poor.However, no well-established dose–response relationship to lighting parameters exists from which one can deduce benchmark levels of lighting for safety.This study looked at a sample of street lighting installations spread over the urban areas of nine territorial local authorities. Standard street lighting parameters were measured in the field using a variety of instruments including illuminance meter, luminance meter and digital camera. Field measurements were related to the ratio of night-time to day time crashes as a measure of night time safety vis-a-vis daytime safety.A statistically significant dose–response relationship was found between average road luminance and safety across all traffic volume groups, with an indication that the relationship may be stronger where more serious crashes are involved.Threshold increment was also a significant variable but not so longitudinal uniformity or overall uniformity.The results related to luminance will allow practitioners to better estimate the safety benefits of different levels of lighting resulting in better targeting of expenditure. Document type: Article

Abstract

In this study we calculate the private costs, marginal external costs, and degree of internalization for all modes in"br" Flanders for the period 2000-2014, with an outlook towards 2016. The private costs are the costs for the user."br" For road transport these include the vehicle purchase costs, insurances, maintenance, fuel costs, etc. For transport"br" services (bus, train, plane) this is the ticket price. Marginal external costs are the costs the user does not take into"br" account when deciding to make a trip. They are called marginal as we focus on the additional effect of that one"br" trip. We considered congestion, environment (air pollution and greenhouse gasses), noise, safety, infrastructure"br" wear & tear and health."br" The internalization of external costs determines the extent to which the user does take into account part of these"br" external costs via taxes and levies. In the case of full internalization, the user pays for all the costs he causes via"br" taxes and levies. Today, in most cases, the user does not pay the full costs he causes."br" Based on our calculations we assessed the evolution of the degree of internalization over time. Is Flanders"br" heading towards the “polluter pays principle”? Which steps are needed to evolve to a better pricing? We found"br" that over the years the level of internalisation is mainly driven by changes in external costs rather than by a"br" targeted adjustment of taxes. Recent changes in taxation such as the changes in the car registration tax, the yearly"br" road tax and the km charge for trucks did lead to an increase in internalisation, but we are still far from full"br" internalisation. Moreover, it would be better to differentiate taxes not only on environmental performance but"br" also on time and place. The levels of internalisation are also very different – not only between modes but also"br" within the road mode.

Abstract

Extreme natural and man-made events can harm the road infrastructure facilities with substantial economic"br" damages. The research presented in this paper focuses on the quantification of the availability and safety of road"br" infrastructure during the occurrence of extreme events. It presents the first results of the implementation of"br" Resilience Engineering to road infrastructure. This work is carried out within the framework of the BMVI"br" Network of Experts of the German Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure as part of the"br" research ‘Quantification and prognosis of the availability and safety of road infrastructure in extreme events’"br" which is a component of the topic ‘Increasing the reliability of transport infrastructures’ lead by the Federal"br" Highway Research Institute (BASt).

Abstract

The scope of this paper is to recognize the needs, restrictions and priorities in developing effort of a breaking through technology that will achieve to enable Cooperative Intelligent Transportation System (C-ITS) applications in existing road infrastructure, to make roads self-explanatory and forgiving for all road users and all vehicle generations with reduced maintenance cost, full recyclability and added value services, as well as supporting real-time predictive road maintenance functions. The enhanced broad functionality of the system on multiple levels imposes emerging needs and demands that will constitute the groundwork of the Use Cases for the implementation of the project, which are extracted through an iterative user-centered methodology approach and correspond to the target applications of the system. More particularly, the needs, views and priorities of all the relevant stakeholders have been captured through the outputs of 431 respondents participated from 10 countries in on-line and in-depth surveys. From the infrastructure point of view, the complementary investigation of relevant accident/incident and gaps/priorities was based on literature while the legal/operational limitations have been based on the study of relevant Directives and the view of experts. These sources provided important qualitative as well as quantitative outcomes, the aggregation of which led to the prioritisation of the target applications, two of which (last in ranking) are considered to be secondary in the sense that can be implemented with some flexibility.

Abstract

The movement of rock raw materials from source to demand areas is carried out predominately with road and railway transport. The latter is less damaging to infrastructure, the environment and society and is cheaper for longer distances, but it is also less flexible and not widely used. The Lower Silesia region in southwestern Poland is an important producer of rock raw materials and the principal provider of igneous and metamorphic dimension stones and crushed rocks in the country. A multicriteria scoring scheme has been developed and applied to identify mines presently using road transport, that are predisposed to switch to or include a railway form of transport. Four criteria have been proposed, C1&mdash distance to railway loading point, C2&mdash annual production of rock raw material, C3&mdash economic reserves, and C4&mdash type of rock raw material. The scoring scheme (classification) was developed based on the results of descriptive statistics for mines presently using railway or combined road and railway forms of transport. Two scenarios were analyzed, one with equal weights (0.25) and the other with higher significance of C1 = 0.40 and C2 = 0.30, and lower significance of C3 = 0.20 and C4 = 0.10. In the result, 24 mines were identified and ranked in terms of their potential to introduce railway transport. The proposed methodology can be used universally for other regions and countries, and the results will be included in drawing up regional spatial development policies. Document type: Article