With the increasing number of toll roads around the world, a perception has come up that the charges at toll gates for a certain road user should be directly related to the potential level of damage that the particular user will cause to the infrastructure. This has led to the consideration of implementing flexible fares schemes, similar to those used for congestion charges. The different elements affecting road deterioration, linked to pavement, environment and the vehicles, combine to create different pavement damaging scenarios. Properties of flexible pavements are strongly dependent on temperature, making them more vulnerable to permanent deformation as the temperature increases. Thus, extreme situations for using the infrastructure would be represented by an empty truck using the pavement when it is less vulnerable, and by a fully loaded truck, using the pavement when it is more vulnerable. In this paper, a conceptual design for a toll station is proposed, in which the toll rate of a particular vehicle is fixed according to its potential damaging effect on the pavement. An intelligent toll station (ITST) must guarantee many safety and productivity aspects. Safety issues include the geometrical design of the approaching road, signs to advert the road users and roadways to return the truck in case the vehicle has to be returned for any reason. Productivity concerns in designing toll stations refer to the minimisation of the impact of toll collection operations on the traffic. To obtain the toll rate as a function of per/axle load and pavement temperature, the ITST must have the means to weigh all the vehicles' axles and to obtain a representative pavement temperature. To avoid major traffic alterations, vehicles' axle loads should be obtained by means of a weigh-in-motion device (WIM). Because the accuracy of WIM devices depends to a great extent on vehicles' velocity, vehicles' speed should be controlled during their approach to the toll station. To evaluate the potential effect of axles on the pavement condition, the ITST must run a computer program that is able to calculate such potential effect and the corresponding fee rate. Considering the difficulties of a driver in getting the exact amount of money to pay the toll, the collecting system should include a vehicle identification device, involving a pre-established contract between the road provider and the trucking companies.
Conceptual design of an intelligent toll station
International Journal of Heavy Vehicle Systems (IJHVS) (Internet) ; 13 , 1/2 ; 98-106
2006
9 Seiten, 4 Bilder, 13 Quellen
Aufsatz (Zeitschrift)
Englisch
Conceptual design of an intelligent toll station
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