Exploration of Lane Changing Behavior on Freeways

Lane changing has received much attention as it is a significant component of microscopic traffic simulation. Many studies have focused on the details of the lane change maneuver from external observation based data which do not consider the type of driver performing the maneuver. This study related the physical details of freeway lane changing to the type of driver performing the maneuver. 46 research participants drove an instrumented vehicle and performed a combined total of 726 freeway lane changes. Each research participant was categorized into one of four groups ranging from conservative to aggressive. The data were analyzed to identify any trends between the different driver types and their lane changing characteristics, specifically lane change duration and gap acceptance characteristics. It was found that, in general, more conservative drivers have greater lane change durations than aggressive drivers. The gap acceptance comparison among driver types did not yield any conclusive trend. In addition, distributions were fitted to lane change duration and gap acceptance histograms. The results suggest that driver types impact freeway lane changing. Therefore, this relationship should not be disregarded when developing lane changing models.