Calibrating Microsimulation Parameters for Vehicular Travel Time

Travel time is one of the simplest yet the most important parameter for transportation facility users as well as transportation engineers. Travel time data is valuable for widerange of transportation analysis including congestion management, transportation planning and passenger'sdecision making.Traffic simulation models are now becoming necessary tools to understand the behavior of traffic and reduce vehicular travel times, but it is very important to calibrate these models first. Thisstudy attempts to determines the values of those parameters,using microsimulation,that significantly affect the travel time. These parameters arethenused for calibrating the traffic simulation model that results in realistic travel time.Study was conducted on an urban road andfield data was collected during weekdays for peak hours. The traffic network was modelled usingVISSIM®.The calibration parameters were desired speed distribution, number of lanes,average standstill distance and minimum headway. After calibrating the model, the travel times collected from field data and those by simulations for different modes of transportation were in close agreement.