Modeling Double Parking Impacts on Urban Street

Double parking (DP) is one of the key contributors to traffic congestion on urban streets. Double parking violations of commercial vehicles while they load and unload at delivery locations with insufficient curbside space can have significant negative impact on traffic. Motivated by the need to study such impact in urban cities, this paper utilizes parking violation records for New York City along with field data collected using video recording, and adopts a comprehensive modeling approach that combines available data with two types of models. The first is an M/M/∞ queueing model used to estimate double parking effect on the average travel time. The second is a micro-simulation model developed and calibrated to study individual and combined effects of various explanatory variables. Both models account for different effects of general vehicles and commercial trucks. Via case studies in Midtown Manhattan and Downtown Brooklyn (New York, US), double parking activities and driver behaviors are investigated and used for comparative analysis. The M/M/∞ queueing model has been empirically validated using field data collected as part of this study. Comparison results show a good fit for uncongested traffic conditions. Micro-simulation results indicate different impact levels for 21 scenarios in four categories namely, travel demand, double parking locations, frequency, and durations. This study can provide traffic agencies a potential approach to quantify the impact of double parking in a large-scale network and insights into the management and alleviation of on-street parking problems including incentives for encouraging off-hour deliveries and more effective enforcement during peak hours.