Research On Installation Alternatives Of Traffic Safety Facilities In School Zone

As the key traffic protection zone, school zone has attracted attention from all sectors in society. The proper use of traffic safety facilities is one of the most common and vital ways to improve the school zone safety. However, in China, there is a lack of installation guidelines or warranties for traffic safety facilities in school zones. In addition, little research has been done to examine the effects of traffic safety facilities in school zones. Therefore, in this paper, in order to improve the traffic safety of school zones, traffic safety facilities were chosen as the focus of concern. Firstly, a field survey was conducted, classified by roadway geometric features, traffic operation conditions, potential movement conflictions between vehicles and pedestrians,the major characteristics of these school zones are summarized and categorized into three types. Then other field survey was conducted to identify the traffic information needs of the crowd with different trip mode. According to the filed investigation results, there were six facilities were chosen. They were School Crossing Ahead Warning Assembly, School Crossing Ahead Informational Sign, Flashing Beacon and School Crossing Ahead Warning Assembly, Speed Limit Sign, Reduce Speed and School Crossing Warning Assembly, School Crossing Ahead Pavement Markings. Afterwards, a driving simulator experiment was conducted to obtain driving behavior data urder different design alternatives with various facilities. Then the rANOVA and the Relative Entropy Model were used to disscuss the effectiveness of diferent facilities, after that, the best design alternative for different types of school zones was obtained. Besides, a traffic safety facility selection model is developed to solve two kinds of problems when deploying traffic safety facilities in engineering practice:1) whether traffic safety facility installation is warranted; and 2) whether other facility effectively complements this traffic safety facility and strengthens its effectiveness. Then by means of KANO model, the standard of facilities installation was classified. Fanally, apart of results from driving simulator experiment was applied in engineering practice to verify the effectiveness of the facility. The consistency between the infield study and field study indicates the feasibility that conducting driving simulator experiment to verify the effectiveness of traffic control devices.The methods and results in this paper were expected to offer theoretical foundation for formulating standards and guiding engineering practice.