A combined methodology for transportation planning assessment. Application to a case study

Traffic assignment models based on the user-equilibrium approach are one of the most widely used tools in transportation planning analysis. Resulting flows offer a static average view of the expected use of the road infrastructure under the modeling hypothesis. This information has usually been enough for the planning decisions. The planned infrastructure is probably sufficient for average demand, but time-varying traffic flows, i.e., at peak periods, combined with the influence of road geometry, can produce undesired congestion that can not be forecast or analysed with the static tools. There is a clear case for a change in the analysis methodology such as combination of a traffic assignment tool with a microscopic traffic simulator. This paper illustrates, by means of a case study, the combination of a well-known traffic assignment tool, the EMME/2 model, with a microscopic traffic simulator, Advanced Interactive Microscopic Simulator For Urban And Non-Urban Networks (AIMSUN2) with emphasis on the description of the specific interfaces that make consistent the combination of both tools in the Generic Environment for Traffic Analysis and Modeling (GETRAM) environment. Models for complex transportation systems should be the combination of mathematical models and computer models, to overcome, for example, the difficulties of the integration of modeling tools. GETRAM environment has an open and flexible computer architecture suitable for such purposes.