Detector delay is one of the most useful detector settings that can be used to directly modify service calls to the signal controller by suppressing the actuation signal for a short period of time. Proper detector delay can be beneficial to the intersection operational performance by allowing right-turning vehicles on the minor street to clear but also minimize unnecessary disruptions to major street traffic. The applicability of detector delay is subject to complex interactions between the major street through traffic and right-turn-on-red (RTOR) traffic on the minor street, including many critical factors such as traffic volume, gap acceptance, and follow-up headway and so on. This paper presents an analytical model to set the detector delay given different combinations of major and minor street volumes by studying the gap-finding process of multiple RTOR vehicles and the time it would therefore require to clear the RTOR queue. Validation of the model was conducted using microscopic simulation package VISSIM. Delay of through movement on the major street and right-turn movement on the minor street was selected as the measure of effectiveness to evaluate the detector delay value recommended by the analytical model.
↧