Stanley Young, PhD, PE

University of MarylandCenter for Advanced Transportation

Technology

Estimates of when penetration will be great enough to impact performance

• Source: FP Think – Effects of Next-Generation Vehicles on Travel Demand and Highway Capacity, Jan 2914

Driver Experience: Stress relief, safety, comfort, and ability to use travel time for other purposes (texting)

Portion of the network over which the AV’s operate

Quality of service by other modes of transport Vehicle costs / new models of sharing

ownership Legality of use by those otherwise not qualified

to drive. Enablement of remote parking/ vehicle storage

• Less congestion due to less accidents, but not significant capacity increases

• Penetration rate not high enough to increase capacity

• Benefits in safety:• Better vehicle following• Less crashes

• Safety benefits to reduce non-reoccurring congestion

• Magnitude up to debate, but measurable

With a larger penetration rate literature/research indicates:

• Lanes could be narrower or support wider high capacity trucks• Much of the width is needed to accommodate

driver behavior• Each lane could support more traffic• Safe driving requires about 9 car length gap

resulting in a capacity of about 2200 vehicles per hour per lane

• Automated platoon could enable lane capacity of 6000-8000 vehicles per hour per lane

Shladover, 2011

FREEWAYSARTERIALS – (GETTING TO URBAN)

• Capacity fundamentally limited by vehicle control

• Must manual driving be eliminated

• Will merge/diverge and ramps provide practical limits

• Can AVL lanes be introduced to capture majority of benefit

• Capacity not fundamentally limited by vehicle control / rather signal control

• AV provides incremental benefits, though not transformational

• Q? How must urban mobility be approached to leverage AV technology

Auto-valet parking may do more to change the urban form Great accessibility More flexible

placement of parking

Less space

Auto-valet parking may do more to change the urban form Great accessibility More flexible

placement of parking

Smaller parking areas

Grayfield Development

Parking

People could theoretically live in their vehicles and have in constantly move

If we follow the same vehicle ownership rates, congestion could get worse

How can we prevent this from happening?

Source: NY Times

Source: NY Post

Why do you need a car?

Shared system (Zip Car)

Taxi like system Solves parking

problem People still need to

get places ‘Mobility by the

Drink’

AV will bring a host of new abilities that will impact mobility, and the urban form

Major impacts are debatable Increased safety, reduction in non-recurrent

congestion Minimal increased capacity on non-freeway facilities AV networks potential for service enhancements Latent demand & empty vehicle circulation may

overrun increased capacity Parking and parking management may be significant AV sharing concepts needed for transformational

change It’s the ‘wild west’ currently, so stay tuned