A Safety-Level-Based-Design of Driving Environment Based on the Behavior Analysis of Drivers

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This study proposes a designing methodology of driving environment for reducing the risk of traffic accidents. Traffic safety measure such as road improvement and traffic management is an effort to change driving environment for making the drivers possible for safer driving.This implies that the understanding of how the change of driving environment affects the driving behavior and how the change of driving behavior affects the level of traffic safety is essential in evaluating the effect of safety measure. The proposed methodology is, therefore, based on both the modeling of drivers performance corresponding with the surrounding traffic and road geometric conditions and the risk level of accident resultant from the driving performance. Major results and findings are as follows.1. Developed a data processing system which can automatically track the movement of vehicles recorded on a video tape.2. Modeled a gap acceptance behavior of a merging vehicle as a discrete choice model. The macroscopic behavior of merging traffic estimated by the proposed model shows a good fitness with the observed one.3. Constructed a model to estimate the rear-end collision risk of a merging car at the instance of merging. A safety index for safety-based-design of road sections is also formulated by using the estimated collision risk.4. Developed an evaluation system of route guide signs supported by a driving simulator with computer graphic image. Sufficient evaluation ability and the applicability of the system was shown through a series of experiments with real driving.5. Proposed a designing methodology of driving environment which is corresponding with the level of traffic safety by integrating the above mentioned research results. The usefulness and the application ability of the methodology was demonstrated through some case study including an evaluation of marine roundabout performance.