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Use of Microscopic Traffic Simulation Software to Determine Heavy-Vehicle Influence on Queue Lengths at Toll Plazas

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Abstract

Highways and expressways provide support for the local, regional, and national transportation of services and goods. Moreover, they are indispensable to economic activities as modern lifestyle would be impossible without them. Activities related to work, education, shopping, tourism, and social are generating a demand for trips. Furthermore, the presence of toll plazas at expressways slows down traffic, thus creating traffic congestion during rush hour. Malaysian toll plazas are considered conventional toll collection, which is manual and the most common toll collection method. Manual toll collection is usually the cause of congestion related to the delay experienced by drivers, toll collection procedure, and operators at the manual toll lanes. This paper aims to examine the effect of the percentage of heavy vehicles on the performance of toll plazas in terms of the queue length using the microscopic traffic simulation model called VISSIM. The findings indicate that the percentage of heavy vehicles in traffic flow significantly affects queue lengths at toll plazas.

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Acknowledgements

The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support from Malaysian Highway Authority (Project No. 304/PAWAM/6050289/L121). Also, the authors wish to express their sincere gratitude to Universiti Sains Malaysia.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Civil Engineering Department, College of Engineering, Muthanna University, Samawah, Muthanna, 66011, Iraq

    Mohammed Bally Mahdi

  2. School of Civil Engineering, Engineering Campus, Universiti Sains Malaysia, 14300, Nibong Tebal, Penang, Malaysia

    Lee Vien Leong & Ahmad Farhan Mohd Sadullah

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  1. Mohammed Bally Mahdi
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  2. Lee Vien Leong
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  3. Ahmad Farhan Mohd Sadullah
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Correspondence to Mohammed Bally Mahdi.

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Mahdi, M.B., Leong, L.V. & Sadullah, A.F.M. Use of Microscopic Traffic Simulation Software to Determine Heavy-Vehicle Influence on Queue Lengths at Toll Plazas. Arab J Sci Eng 44, 7297–7311 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13369-019-03809-7

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