Driving Behavior in Case of Haze: A High Fidelity Driving Simulator Study

Adverse weather conditions, like haze, have been found to have significant impacts on traffic flow operations. Recently, a weather condition with serious haze has occurred in Eastern China. It is characterized by low visibility with the haze condition. Traffic flows were severely affected, resulting in many severe traffic accidents and traffic jams. This paper utilizes the high fidelity Tongji Driving Simulator to investigate the impacts of the haze weather condition on driving behaviors. The parameters in the model of describing the driving behavior are studied, which include the desired speed, the maximum desired acceleration/deceleration rates, and the mean acceleration/deceleration rates. Experiments with 15 participants are carried out. The results show that the haze weather condition has a significant impact on the desired speed, the maximum desired acceleration/deceleration rates, and the mean acceleration/deceleration rates. An important finding is that the heterogeneities among drivers in their desired speeds decrease substantially with the reductions in visibility during the haze weather condition.