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Federal Highway Administration Research and Technology
Coordinating, Developing, and Delivering Highway Transportation Innovations
| REPORT |
| This report is an archived publication and may contain dated technical, contact, and link information |
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| Publication Number: FHWA-HRT-15-082 Date: December 2015 |
Publication Number: FHWA-HRT-15-082 Date: December 2015 |
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Gaining an indepth understanding of drivers’ decisions and behaviors in dilemma zone situations will help State, county, and city transportation agencies to develop and deploy effective countermeasures to improve safety and reduce potential crashes at signalized intersections. This study’s objective is to develop a dilemma zone behavior model that considers the effects on drivers of certain factors found at signalized intersections, such as the presence of a pedestrian countdown signal, the presence of a red-light photo enforcement camera, and the actions of an adjacent vehicle. Federal Highway Administration’s (FHWA’s) Highway Driving Simulator was used to collect drivers’ responses as a function of speed limit and whether the driver was in a hurry. A dilemma zone behavior model was developed based on data collected in the driving simulation experiments via agent-based modeling and simulation. Results from the experiments suggested that sufficient external information, such as the presence of a red-light photo enforcement camera, can accurately predict the drivers’ decisions when they were confronted with the dilemma zone. The dilemma zone behavior model also takes into account the interactions between vehicles and provides realistic predictions of driver behaviors under various traffic conditions.
Monique R. Evans
Director, Office of Safety
Research and Development
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Technical Report Documentation Page
| 1. Report No.
FHWA-HRT-15-082 |
2. Government Accession No. | 3 Recipient's Catalog No. | ||
| 4. Title and Subtitle
Agent-Based Modeling and Simulation in the Dilemma Zone |
5. Report Date December 2015 |
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| 6. Performing Organization Code | ||||
| 7. Author(s)
Sojung Kim, Young-Jun Son, Mary Anne Jeffers, Jason Williams, Yi-Chang Chiu |
8. Performing Organization Report No.
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9. Performing Organization Name and Address University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721 |
10. Work Unit No. (TRAIS) |
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| 11. Contract or Grant No. | ||||
| 12. Sponsoring Agency Name and Address
Federal Highway Administration |
13. Type of Report and Period Covered
Final Report |
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14. Sponsoring Agency Code HRDS-30 |
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| 15. Supplementary Notes
FHWA Contracting Officer's Representative (COR): Dr. C. Y. David Yang |
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| 16. Abstract
The goal of this study is to develop a realistic dilemma zone (DZ) model that considers the effects of factors surrounding vehicles at an intersection, particularly focusing on driver decisionmaking behavior, such as the presence of a pedestrian countdown signal, a red-light photo enforcement camera, and the actions of an adjacent vehicle. The Federal Highway Administration’s Highway Driving Simulator (HDS) was used to collect drivers’ responses as a function of facility speed limit and whether the driver was in a hurry. From these responses, a DZ model was developed via agent-based modeling and simulation (ABMS) under the extended belief-desire-intention (E-BDI) framework. This framework represents uncertain perception and decision behaviors of humans in a probabilistic manner. To demonstrate and validate the proposed approach, the drivers’ actions under two circumstances were compared: (1) drivers only knew the approach speed and distance to the stop (i.e., internal information); and (2) drivers knew the internal information as well as external information, such as presence of a pedestrian countdown signal or presence of a red-light photo enforcement camera, and the behavior of an adjacent vehicle. The experiments indicate that sufficient external information could accurately predict the decisions of drivers and thus reduce the number of red-light violations that could potentially cause accidents at an intersection. In addition, the proposed E-BDI-based DZ model allowed us to consider the physical interactions between vehicles such that it provides realistic prediction results of drivers under various traffic conditions. |
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| 17. Key Words
dilemma zone, driving simulator, time pressure, driving in a hurry, red light photo enforcement camera, pedestrian countdown signal, adjacent vehicle, red-light running |
18. Distribution Statement
No restrictions. This document is available to the public through the National Technical Information Service, Springfield, VA 22161. |
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19. Security Classification Unclassified |
20. Security Classification Unclassified |
21. No. of Pages 48 |
22. Price
N/A |
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| Form DOT F 1700.7 (8-72) | Reproduction of completed page authorized |
SI* (Modern Metric) Conversion Factors
3 Overview of Research Methodology
4 DZ Data Collection Using a Highway Driving Simulator
Appendix A. Post-Participation Survey
| ABMS | Agent-based Modeling and Simulation |
| BBN | Bayesian Belief Network |
| CD/M2 | Candela per Square Meter |
| CI | Confidence Interval |
| DZ | Dilemma Zone |
| E-BDI | Extended Belief-Desire Intention |
| EDFT | Extended Decision Field Theory |
| fL | Foot-lambert |
| GEE | Generalized Estimating Equations |
| HDS | Highway Driving Simulator |
| ITE | Institute of Traffic Engineers |
| KM/H | Kilometers per Hour |
| MI/H | Miles per Hour |
| NHTSA | National Highway Traffic Safety Administration |
| PRT | Perception-Reaction Time |
| SEM | Structural Equation Modeling |
| S-D | Speed-Distance |
