Citation

Henderson S, Stamatiadis N. J. Transp. Res. Forum 2001; 40(2): 137-145.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2001, Transportation Research Forum)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Increased traffic congestion on urban highways has prompted the need to examine and implement innovative ways to accommodate the traffic. Potential alternatives include the use of unusual left turn treatments, prohibition of left turns at intersections, and rerouting of left turns at a U-turn point past the intersection. This study examined the implementation of median U-turns along an urban principal arterial in Kentucky. Traffic simulation was utilized to evaluate different alternatives including signal optimization, addition of through traffic lanes, and the implementation of median U-turns in 2 stages. Study results show that median U-turn strategies proved to be a more effective tool for traffic management along this arterial than simply adding a lane in each direction. The median U-turns showed significant improvements in all operating measures of the road and average delay was the measure that improved most at all intersections.