Modeling the asymmetry in traffic flow (a): Microscopic approach

The asymmetric characteristic of a vehicle's ability in deceleration and acceleration, as well as its impact to micro- and macroscopic traffic flow has caused increased attention from both theoretical and practical sides. However, how to realistically model this property remains a challenge to researchers. This paper is one of the two studies on this topic, which is focused on the modeling at the microscopic level from the investigation of car-following behavior. The second part of the study [H. Liu, H. Xu, H. Gong, Modeling the asymmetry in traffic flow (b): macroscopic approach, Appl. Math. Model. (submitted for publication)] is focused on the modeling of this asymmetric property from the macroscopic scale. In this paper, we first present an asymmetric full velocity difference car-following approach, in which a higher order differential equation is developed to take into account the effect of asymmetric acceleration and deceleration in car-following. Then, efforts are dedicated to calibrate the sensitivity coefficients from field data to complete the theoretical approach. Using the data recorded from the main lane traffic and ramp traffic of a segment of the US101 freeway, the two sensitivity coefficients have been successfully calibrated from both congested and light traffic environments. The experimental study reveals that in the studied traffic flow, the intensity of positive velocity difference term is significantly higher than the negative velocity difference term, which agrees well with the results from studies on vehicle mechanics. (C) 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.