Highways Agency - Safe roads, Reliable journeys, Informed travellers

Project Background

The HA is committed to delivering Safe roads, Reliable journeys and informed travellers. The Department for Transport's congestion target challenges the HA to make journeys more reliable on the strategic road network going forward. In order to meet this and future years targets the HA is investigating new and innovative ways of Increasing Network Capacity.

Although the use of a dedicated lane for Single Lane Tolling has been considered as part of the previous work "Support to the Managed Motorway Project" known as INC II, in line with improving journey time reliability whilst encouraging sustainable road use the HA want to gauge and understand driver behaviour and response to the utilizing a dedicated lane for use of car sharers or those road users driving "greener vehicles" whilst full time through junction running is in operation.

The work is in support of the draft green paper covering managed motorways "Roads — Delivering Choice and Reliability" and the publication of "Delivering a Sustainable Transport System" last year. The Secretary of State for Transport made a statement in the House of Commons on 15 January 2009 in which he announced the publication of the paper "Britain's Transport Infrastructure - Motorways and Major Trunk Roads". This project is inextricably linked to the progress of this work.

Project Objectives

The main objectives of the task are:

• Study 1: FT TJR vs. PT TJR
This study will compare driver behaviour in Part Time Through Junction Running (PT TJR) to that observed in Full Time Through Junction Running (FT TJR). Drivers may find certain aspects of PT TJR less intuitive than those in FT TJR. The main differences between PT TJR and FT TJR are the signs and lane markings used and the status of the hard shoulder within junctions.

• Study 2: FT TJR and designated lane
This study will evaluate drivers' responses to a novel scheme incorporating a designated lane within FT TJR scheme. The aims are to examine driver behaviour when both FT TJR and a designated lane are in place, where particular interest will be paid to moving to/from the designated lane and the decision as to where, when and how drivers choose to use LBS1 and the designated lane. The designated lane shall be a 'green' lane in which only vehicles fulfilling environmentally based criterion shall be permitted (e.g. vehicles below a specified CO2 g/km emission threshold).

Project Summary

The HA have identified two studies that will build upon the work already undertaken by TRL in connection with managed motorways simulation study. They again examine driver behaviour with Through Junction Running (TJR); firstly, comparing its full time (FT) and part time (PT) operation and secondly, in the presence of a designated lane:

Study 1: FT TJR vs. PT TJR
In terms of guidance for future implementation of TJR, the Highways Agency would like to understand the differences in driver behaviour when PT TJR is used when compared to that observed with FT TJR.

Study 2: FT TJR and designated lane
The Highways Agency would like to understand driver behaviour in response to the presence of FT TJR on motorways where a designated lane (such as a car share lane or 'green' lane) also features.

Task objectives and specification
The objective of this work is to use a driving simulator to assess participant behaviour in relation to the arrangements/layouts contained in the Managed Motorways guidance IAN (Interim Advice Note) 111/08 & IAN 112/08).

Publications Listing

• Full Time Through Junction Running Simulation Study
• Full Time Through Junction Running with Designated Green Lane Simulation Study