BANGLADESH UNIVERSITY OF ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY, DHAKA -1000

OFFICE OF THE MEMBER SECRETARY OF THE COMMITTEE FOR ADVANCED

STUDIES AND RESEARCH, BUET, DHAKA

Application for the approval of M.Sc. Engg. Thesis Proposal

Date: 22 April, 2015

1. Name of the student : M. M. A. Kader Chowdhury.

Status : Full Time

Roll no. : 0412042442F

Session : April, 2012.

2. Present Address : ‘Green Dale’, Flat- A3, 3rd Floor,

Road-10, House-13,

Section – 6, Block- C,

Mirpur,

Dhaka-1216

3. Name of the Department : Civil Engineering

Programme : M. Sc. Engg. (Transportation)

4. Name of the Supervisor : Dr. Md. Shamsul Hoque

Professor

Department of Civil Engineering

BUET, Dhaka-1000

5. Date of First Enrolment into M. Sc. Program: April, 2012

6. Tentative Title:

PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF ROAD INTERSECTIONS OF DHAKA

METROPOLITON CITY

7. Background and Present State of the Problem:

The system of interconnected roads, designed for the accommodation of vehicles and pedestrians,

is called Road Network. in a Road Network, there are two vital elements: Link and Node. ‘Node’

is also named as intersection and ‘Link’ is the connecting element between the two intersections.

in a Road – Traffic system, intersection is a place where two or more roads meet together.

Intersections are one of the important bottlenecks, which interrupt the smooth flow of traffic and

there by cause delay. This is the vital area of road network, though this is a very small area within

the road network, but this is a very important one. For avoiding the unnecessary delay or to get an

efficient traffic flow movement, these intersections need to be planned and designed properly and

carefully. Along with the appropriate road network and geometry, the necessary the necessary

traffic control device also needs to be applied wisely. Overall, we have to keep eyes on the

performance of intersection for getting an efficient road network.

In the developed countries like USA, UK, Australia, to obtain orderly movement of vehicles

through intersections they have strict traffic control rules, regulation and well established

planning, designing methodology for geometric design of road intersection and as well as standard

guidelines for the application for geometric design of road intersection and as well as standard

guidelines for the application of traffic control devices. Because of these practice, clear pattern in

queue formation and discharging can be seen from road junctions of these countries. Day by day,

they have been adopting least traffic engineering tools to provide better performance of the

intersection, which is the vital part of road network.

The Road – Traffic system in Bangladesh is going through the worst phase since its formation. all

major signalized intersections within the urban areas have got severe traffic congestion which

produce long delay and insurmountable sufferings of the road users in Dhaka City. This is

happening mainly because of inappropriate / ill planning road network, faulty layout configuration

of the intersections, in appropriate synchronization of traffic signal, arbitrary setting of signal time

& phasing, poor enforcement in signal control and many other factors. However, from the fields

observation it has been identified that most of the total problems which cause traffic congestion is

the intersections.

Field observation revealed the faulty geometric condition of the intersections; illegal

encroachment and random pedestrian crossing are responsible for junction delay. Moreover,

improper turning radius, absence of medians and signs and faulty operation of police, absence of

following the lane system, etc. are some factors which are causing delay, making intersection

inoperative, degrading the overall performance of intersection.

As such, to augment overall capacity of road network, it is necessary to improve the performance

of intersection. This study attempts to investigate the selected intersections of Dhaka city, times to

evaluate them and compares them with the ideal condition and ranks them according to their

performance.

8. Objectives and possible outcomes:

The study is aimed at performance evaluation of selected road intersections of Dhaka

Metropolitan City. It will help the City Authority and Government to evaluate the present

condition of Dhaka Metropolitan City road network, also help them to find out the appropriate

solution of the present ill operated condition and give a conceptual idea of economic loss due to

present operation of intersections. Moreover, it will help to find out the probable ranking system

of road intersection inside Dhaka Metropolitan City. The main objective –s of this study is:

a) To acquire geometric and operating conditions of selected junctions.

b) To determine existing vehicular, pedestrian traffic flow, amount of side friction, condition

of traffic control devices including signal timing, phasing and mode of operation.

c) To determine intersection level of service (LOS) by assessing v /c ratio, queue length,

delay and road occupancy.

d) To evaluate performance of the junctions based on LOS ranking and accident record.

e) To recommend junction performance improvement measures.

9. Outline of Proposed Methodology:

For finding out the intersection’s performance in a busy city like Dhaka, it will be better to follow some

criteria, such as:

a) Traffic point of view.

b) Level of Service (LOS) point of view.

c) Accident point of view.

Brief description of these points are described below –

In a road network, vehicle is a very important element. We cannot avoid its contribution in road

network. For evaluating the road intersection of Dhaka Metropolitan City, at first it is important to find

the hourly volume of traffic in these intersections. From this vehicle count survey, it would be easy to

find out directional distribution (%DD) of vehicle, vehicle classification, trend of traffic flow in these

intersections. Then it can be compared with ideal value of road network. These results will help to rank

these intersections of Dhaka city with respect to traffic volume.

Generally, Level of Service (LOS) is a qualitative measure used to relate the quality of traffic service.

LOS is used to analyze road network with respect of queue length, delay, signal phasing and timing,

etc. In this research, the intersection of Dhaka Metropolitan City Area can be evaluated on the basis of

Level of Service (LOS). So, signal timing and its phasing related to road network can be assessed in

this research; pedestrian interference on traffic flow can be identified, overall, the delay of vehicle in

the intersection can be measured. It will help the researcher to find out the Level of Service (LOS) of

the intersection. It will give a chance for the comparison with the modern city road network.

Truly, the majority of road crashes or accidents are caused by human error. Research has shown that

driver accounts for over 80% of all fatal and injury crashes on road network. In this research, inside the

Dhaka Metropolitan City area, accident data can be found from secondary sources, such as: ARI

(Accident Research Institute, Police Headquarter, etc.). This accident data will help researcher to rank

these intersections of Dhaka city.

In this way, the researcher may able to find out the performance of road intersection of Dhaka

Metropolitan City.

10. References:

1. National Association of Australian State Road Authorities [1976], “Guide to Traffic

Engineering Practice”, Sydney, Australia.

2. Road Research Laboratory [1965], “Department of Scientific and Industrial Research

on Road Traffic.” HMSO, London, U.K.

3. Highway Research Board [1994], “Highway Capacity Manual”, HRB, Special Report

No. 209, USA.

4. Institute of Traffic Engineers [1994], “Transportation and Traffic Engineering

Handbook”, Second Edition, Prentice-Hall Inc. New Jersey, USA.

5. Kadialy, L. R. [1983], “Traffic Engineering and Transport Planning”, Second

Edition, Khanna Publishers, Delhi, India.

6. Papacostas, C. S. & Prevedorous, P. D. [2001], “Transportation Engineering &

Planning”, Third Edition, Prentice-Hall of India Private Limited, New Delhi,110

001,2006.

7. Khisty, C. Jotin & Kent Lall, B. [2003], “Transportation Engineering An

Introduction”, Third Edition, Prentice-Hall of India Private Limited, New Delhi, 110

001, 2006.

8. Matson, M. Theodore, Smith, S. Wilbur & Hurd, W. Fredrick [1955], “Traffic

Engineering”, Mc Graw-Hill Book Company, New York, Toronto and London,1955.

9. Ogden, K. W. [1996], “Safer Roads: Guide to Road Safety Engineering”, Avebury

Technical, Brookfield, USA.