Environmental Performance Evaluation at Urban Roundabouts

Abstract

Transformation toward greener, healthier and safer management of urban mobility demand is needed soon. Smart tools are available to assess the impact of new infrastructural projects and road facilities also from an environmental point of view. In this pilot study pollutant emissions at a sample of urban roundabouts were estimated employing the Vehicle Specific Power methodology which needs second-by-second speed profiles both gathered in the field and simulated in AIMSUN. The versatility of the micro-simulation model for a calibration aimed at improving accuracy of the emissions estimates was tested in order to ensure that second-by-second trajectories experienced in the field properly reflected the simulated speed-time profiles. The results confirmed the feasibility of the smart approach that integrates the use of fieldobserved and simulated data to estimate emissions at urban roundabouts. It is also revealed friendly in collecting information via smartphone and in the subsequent data analysis, and provided new opportunities for a large-scale data collection through a digital community