DEVELOPMENT OF UNSIGNALISED INTERSECTION ANALYSIS PROCEDURE FOR THE MALAYSIAN HIGHWAY CAPACITY MANUAL

This thesis discusses the development of unsignalised intersection analysis
procedure for the Malaysian Highway Capacity Manual (MHCM 2006). Unsignalised
intersection plays an important role in determining the capacity of a road network
especially in urban and suburban areas. Currently, Malaysia has been adopting the
United States Highway Capacity Manual 1985 (U.S. HCM 1985) as the procedure to
evaluate unsignalised intersections and known as the Arahan Teknik (Jalan) 11/87.

In order to develop a procedure based on Malaysian traffic condition, the United
States Highway Capacity Manual 2000 is adopted with the input parameters which are
determined based on local data. The input parameters that are estimated are critical
gap, follow-up time and adjustment factor for capacity with respect to vehicle
composition and type of intersection. However, only passenger car and motorcycle are
involved since the data of heavy vehicle is less and not adequate.

There are thirty three intersections being investigated in this study. The data
collection involves urban and suburban area along west coast of Peninsular Malaysia.
The new Malaysian procedure is the adaptation of the two-way stop-controlled
procedure based on the United States Highway Capacity Manual 2000 for three legs
junction or T-junction, which is the most available unsignalised intersection in the study
area. Critical gap can not be determined directly from field but data of accepted and
rejected gaps can be collected and analysed. Data of gaps were collected using video
camera and other several equipments. The maximum likelihood method is used in the
determination of critical gap. Follow-up time can be observed directly from the field but
in this study, it is observed and estimated from the traffic flow at the intersection which
was recorded by the video camera. In the estimation of adjustment factor, equipment
from JAMAR Technology was used to collect delay at intersection.

The uniqueness of this analysis procedure is the consideration of motorcycle in
the estimation of critical gap, follow-up time and capacity. The values of critical gap
and follow-up time for single and multi-lane vary from 3.2 to 4.2 seconds and 1.9 to 2.4
seconds respectively. The adjustment factor varies according to type of intersection.

The analysis procedure is developed with respect to Malaysian traffic conditions
to help engineers, researchers and planners to obtain accurate assessments of
capacity as well as the level of service of intersections. This study can be continued in
the future in order to improve the values of input parameters and also develop the
analysis procedure for four-leg intersection and roundabout not only for urban and
suburban areas, but also for rural area.
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