Freeway Incidents: Simulation and Analysis

This report presents an analysis of freeway incidents on the Salt Lake Valley freeway network. Different types of incidents at the most common/difficult locations are analyzed through traffic microsimulation using VISSIM simulation software. The analysis focuses on incident induced freeway delays, but it also looks into other parameters, such as vehicle throughput, travel times and network-wide delays. The goal of this project is to develop a set of incident management strategies that would help TOC operators to make decisions that will optimize their response in terms of time and resulted delay, and minimize users’ cost due to delay on the freeway network.