Meeting the challenge of traffic management and signalization for the Bus Rapid Transit for Johannesburg

Abstract

Paper presented at the 28th Annual Southern African Transport Conference 6 - 9 July 2009 "Sustainable Transport", CSIR International Convention Centre, Pretoria, South Africa.

This paper highlights several innovative signalization and traffic management solutions unique to the challenges posed by the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) project for Johannesburg. Many of the signaling solutions will be new to the current road user and will require "getting used to", but are deemed essential for the smooth operation of the BRT and for the safety of all other road users. The solutions are not necessarily "high tech", but they certainly expand the conventional boundaries of traffic signal phasing within the ambit of the SARTSM. The solutions include fully protected right turn phases across the BRT, mixed traffic deviation routing techniques as a result of right turns not being allowed across the BRT, complex intersection signal phasing for multi-directional BRT routing, signalized inter-median pedestrian crossings, innovative traffic management schemes necessitated by severe road space constraints and a BRT station configuration unique to South Africa. Micro-simulation modelling was used to demonstrate the workability of several of the more complex solutions. It is concluded that all of the solutions explored and proposed for this paper meet the challenges created by the design of the BRT for Johannesburg. It is further recommended that all these proposals be implemented as part of the BRT rollout.