VISSIM 5.40 Highlights
The new VISSIM 5.40 is released now. The highlights include:
Lateral behaviour - controlling the lateral movement
Lateral behaviour - controlling the lateral movement
Vehicles always try to improve their lateral position within the lane. They are therefore always checking if changing lanes may be worth the effort. This can lead to twitchy behaviour, in which vehicles are seesawing all the time. In order to reduce or control this lateral movement, the user can now configure the vehicles' behaviour based on three criteria:
- The minimum benefit that must be achieved before a vehicle wants to change its lateral position
- A minimum speed at which a lateral movement can be performed in general
- The least amount of time that must elapse between two lateral movements in different directions
Cooperative lane changing and advanced merging
Cooperative lane changing and advanced merging
If the "Cooperative lane change" option is active, vehicles change lanes pro-actively to allow other vehicles to change lanes. As in the real world, this happens under certain conditions.
Vehicles do not cooperate when they or the following vehicles are forced to perform extreme braking maneuvers or when the new lane is not part of their route.
In addition to cooperative lane changing, there is an additional component called "advanced merging" that leads to realistic simulation of zipper-like merging behavior. The advanced merging option allows more vehicles to change lanes earlier and thus increases the capacity and reduces the probability of standing vehicles waiting for a lane change. This is made possible by a set of rules that takes into account the differences in speed between vehicles on adjacent lanes, as well as the distance between vehicles and the behaviour of vehicles downstream.
Comparisons with empirical data have shown that capacities in merging scenarios can be modeled realistically using the "Cooperative lane changing" and "advanced merging" options.
- cooperative behaviour
- uncooperative behaviour
Maneuvering time for curb-side parking
Maneuvering time for curb-side parking
- Blocking Time
Curb-side parking maneuvers require varying amounts of time, depending on size of the parking space and the skill of the driver. Depending on the number of lanes in the main lane and the traffic volume, this may lead to disruptions in the traffic flow, in other words, traffic jams due to backups.
To mimic the parking maneuver and the resulting disruptions, parking time can now be optionally entered for parking spaces in VISSIM.
The parking time is from the instant the parking vehicle initially stops at its parking space (rear of the vehicle is still outside the parking space) to the final standstill (parked, the vehicle is parallel to the road).
Smoothly approaching obstacles
Smoothly approaching obstacles
This new option allows you to smooth the cycle of acceleration/braking when a vehicle approaches an obstacle such as a red light, stop sign, or the end of a traffic jam. The key here is to avoid unnecessary and unrealistic acceleration on the way to stopping the vehicle. This is particularly important when the simulation results need to be extremely accurate, for example, when vehicle trajectories are being used for emission modelling. Smooth close-up avoids an overestimation of the emission results.
Route filters for Vehicle Report and Lane Changes
Route filters for Vehicle Report and Lane Changes
Route filters are now available to reduce the size of Vehicle Reports and Lane Change evaluation files.
Driving simulator interface
Driving simulator interface
VISSIM can be coupled with driving simulators using the new driving simulator interface. This enables the creation of a realistic traffic environment (including traffic signals) in a driving simulator. The vehicles interact with each other and with the driving simulator controlled vehicle according to the driving behaviour models in VISSIM. This setup can also be used to create specific situations in VISSIM from the outside.
The driver in the driving simulator drives through a VISSIM model and the vehicles interact with the driving simulator vehicle as if it's one of them.
- Driving Simulator Interface
External tools: AMPEL provides an interface to VISSIM
External tools: AMPEL provides an interface to VISSIM
- AMPEL-Interface
The AMPEL tool is software for planning, optimisation and analyzing traffic light systems (for more information, see BPS GmbH).
AMPEL now uses the ANM interface, which enables complete models (including pedestrians and public transport) with fixed time signal control to be exported to VISSIM. The development of traffic-actuated signal control systems in VISSIM is supported by automatic generation of a phase transition files.
