Identifying and evaluating various regulatory countermeasures to traffic congestion in selected intersections of Mekelle city

Abstract

Traffic congestion reduces the effective accessibility of residents, activities and jobs resulting in lost opportunities for both the public and business. Longer journey times, higher fuel consumption and increased emissions of air pollutants are some of the impacts of congestion. Traffic congestion is a major phenomenon in most intersection of Mekelle city, especially in kedamay weyane sub city. Therefore, this thesis attempts to first evaluate the state of traffic congestion, then offers some suggested countermeasures to lessen the congestion, illustrates the results of applying the countermeasures at the chosen intersections, and finally outlines the factors that contribute to the congestion. The congestion is measured by determining the level of service (LOS) . And the LOS was analyzed by VISSIM software using peak hour turning traffic volume, vehicle composition and geometry of the intersections as input data. For determining peak hour turning traffic volume the calculation is made through the manual counting of vehicles and multiplying by passenger car unit factor (PCU factor) to determine passenger car equivalent (PCE). The LOS output among the 9 selected intersections around kedamay weyane sub city the 6 of them are below D. By applying some regulatory countermeasures for the only 6 congested intersections and reanalyze the LOS of all intersections, most LOS of the selected intersections is become to above LOS C. Even though the LOS of intersection 1 and some turning movements in intersection 8 are decrease after apply the counter measures; because some minibus taxi routes are changes to them, most LOS of the selected intersections are become A, B and C. At final this thesis concluded that high number of bajaj using the intersection, the route of minibus taxi concentrated to one direction, stop vehicles near intersections and illegal trading on walk way and traffic lane are the cause of the traffic congestion.