Study Details

Study Title: Safety Evaluation of Hybrid Mainline Toll Plazas

Authors: Abuzwidah, et al.

Publication Date:JAN, 2014

Abstract: Traditional mainline toll plazas on expressways may have both safety and operational challenges. While many studies demonstrated the operational and environmental impacts of the conversion from traditional toll plazas to a barrier-free system (Open Road Tolling), there is a lack of research that quantifies the safety benefits of new tolling systems. This study evaluated the safety effectiveness of the conversion from Traditional Mainline Toll Plaza (TMTP) design to Hybrid Mainline Toll Plaza (HMTP) system. HMTP combines both an Open Road Tolling (ORT) on the mainline and separate traditional toll collection to the side. Various observational before-after studies were applied on ninety-eight mainline toll plazas (two directions) located on approximately 750 miles of toll roads in the State of Florida; thirty of them were upgraded to HMTPs. The multivariate Empirical Bayes (EB) method produced the best crash modification factors with low standard errors, and its results indicated that the conversion from TMTP to HMTP system resulted in an average crash reduction of 47 percent, 46 percent and 54 percent for total crashes, fatal-and-injury crashes and property damage only crashes, respectively. The use of HMTP system also significantly reduced rear end crashes and lane change related crashes by an average of 65 percent and 55 percent, respectively. Overall, the use of HMTP system was proven to be an excellent solution to several traffic operations, environmental and economic problems. The results of this study proved that the safety effectiveness across all locations that were upgraded to HMTP was significantly improved.

Study Citation: Abuzwidah, M., M. Abdel-Aty, and M.M. Ahmed. "Safety Evaluation of Hybrid Mainline Toll Plazas". Paper presented at the 93rd meeting of the Transportation Research Board, Paper No. 14-3788, Washington, D.C., (2014).

Related Citations: Abuzwidah, M. and M. Abdel-Aty. "Safety assessement of the conversion of toll plazas to all-electric toll collection system". Accident Analysis and Prevention, Vol. 80, (2015) pp. 153-161.


CMFs Associated With This Study

Category: Roadway

Countermeasure: Convert traditional mainline toll plazas to hybrid mainline toll plazas

CMF CRF(%)QualityCrash TypeCrash SeverityRoadway TypeArea Type
CMF Equation3 StarsAllAllPrincipal Arterial OtherAll
CMF Equation3 StarsAllK,A,B,CPrincipal Arterial OtherAll
CMF Equation3 StarsAllOPrincipal Arterial OtherAll
0.34663 StarsRear endAllPrincipal Arterial OtherAll
0.45553 StarsAngle,Sideswipe,OtherAllPrincipal Arterial OtherAll