Spatial aspects of traffic circulation: I. A review of alternative systems

One of the key aims of traffic management is to encourage drivers to follow an efficient routing pattern (i.e. a set of routes that collectively minimise the potential for delays and accidents and possibly also minimise travel distance). At present, little is known about the relative merits of different patterns or how they could be accommodated or encouraged within existing city centre networks. A number of archetypes are compared using total vehicle conflicts and total travel distance as the main criteria. They include several that have not previously appeared in the literature, and, the conflicts are weighted to reflect variations in the severity of the interactions between vehicles carrying out different turning movements at junctions. The results indicate wide variations in the characteristics of different routing patterns and suggest new ways of organising the spatial pattern of traffic circulation as possible alternatives to the conventional gyratory system.