Mitigation of traffic disaster by analyzing motorist’s movement behavior based on an image captured by a drone

Abstract

Uncontrolled motorists’ movement behavior could trigger a disaster for road users. A deep understanding of the motorist’s movement behavior might improve our mitigation planning. This paper presents an observation of the movement of motorists from a minor road crossing a major road at an unsignalised intersection. The study’s objectives are to estimate the gap and lag of motorcyclists when crossing the intersection, observe the forced gap, and predict the effect of traffic volume on the variation of the gap and lag. The case study was located at the intersection between Ahmad Yani Road as a major road and Bandar Purus Road as a minor road in Padang, Indonesia. A drone was used and placed vertically above the center of the intersection to record the movement. The study found that the average lag is 2.4 seconds at off-peak, and the average gap is 4.3 seconds; at the peak hour are 2.0 seconds and 3.1 seconds, respectively. At peak hours, more than 80% of motorcyclists are committed to the force gap/lag.