6.0 Other Applications
6.1 Pennsylvania I-80
In the Summer of 2002, motorists on Interstate 80 in Clarion County, Pennsylvania experienced significant delays and frustrations caused by traffic back-ups in highway work zones. As a result, some complaints and concerns were conveyed to PENNDOT. Expecting similar public reaction regarding future construction activities, PENNDOT looked for tools and methods to eliminate these complaints and concerns. In Summer 2003, before beginning a resurfacing project on Interstate 80 in Butler and Clarion counties, PennDOT District 10 used QuickZone to create highway work zones that minimize impacts on the traveling public.
Applying QuickZone to the I-80 project, PENNDOT engineers were able to select work zone configurations and construction schedules that met project needs while minimizing impacts to the traveling public. Based on the reduced number of complaints and the length of time motorists have been delayed in the work zone, PENNDOT feels the effort was successful. "We are very pleased with the results of QuickZone modeling," said Richard H. Hogg, P.E., District Executive. "Based on what we saw occur on the Interstate last year compared to this year, the improvements for our customers, the traveling public, are significant."
6.2 Virginia Calibration Sites
Two construction sites in Northern Virginia were chosen to validate and verify the results of QuickZone 1.0. In August and September 2001, detailed data collection was conducted at a site in Purcelville, VA and McLean, VA. The sites are located approximately 60 and 10 miles, respectively, west of Washington, DC. The construction for both sites was similar and included two-way one lane operations on a bridge where the bridge deck was being replaced. Both sites include the use of a temporary traffic control signal that include a fixed signal timing plan that changed by time-of-day.
Data collection was conducted over a two week period at both sites and included volume counts, travel time and incident logs. For each site a QuickZone network was developed and all necessary data was entered. The results that were generated by QuickZone were reflected in the field in terms of queue and delay. The Purcelville site saw no queue or delay during the baseline conditions (no construction) and slight queuing, less than .10 miles, during construction. The delay was under 5 minutes. The McLean site saw a larger queue, .25 miles, with delay also being less than 5 minutes.
6.3 ITS Technology Assessment
At the 2004 TRB Annual Meeting, Rob Bushman (Rob.Bushman@usask.ca) presented a paper entitled "Estimating The Benefits Of Deploying Intelligent Transportation Systems In Work Zones" where QuickZone was used to help estimate the benefits of deploying ITS in work zones. An evaluation was made of the expected benefits of the application of ITS technology to a construction project on I-95 in North Carolina. QuickZone was used to model two situations, a base case without the use of a traffic management system and the alternate case of a traffic management system applied. Estimations were also made of the expected reduction in emissions and the expected reduction in injuries and fatalities. The analysis demonstrated the application of analysis methods that can be applied generally to work zone ITS projects of this type and a favorable benefit/cost ratio expected for the specific project studied. User delay has the potential to provide significant benefits in relation to costs and other benefits, and therefore should be one of the initial decision making criteria. A user delay graph was presented which estimates the amount of delay based on traffic volume and composition.
6.4 Other Nova Scotia Projects
In addition to the two case studies presented in this document, QuickZone has been widely used throughout the Nova Scotia Province. Two other examples include:
- Highway 125—Re-paving Projects
QuickZone was used to make the case for night work and to define working hours on two projects on Highway 125, which is the main arterial highway for the city of Sydney and surrounding communities. - Highway 104—Canso Causeway – Repaving, Bridge Repair and Rotary Upgrade
QuickZone was used to make the case for night work and to define working hours on three projects at the Canso Causeway, which connects Cape Breton Island with the mainland.
