Investigation of Conflicts Between Railway and Road Network Interaction and Their Impacts on the Operation: The Case Addis Ababa Light Rail Transit
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Date
2023-07
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
Due to quick financial growth, Addis Ababa city has a high traffic issue, which affects the movement of pedestrians, goods, and tracks where business is also affected. Addis Ababa Light Rail Transit (AALRT)has been involved in solving the problem. This research aims to investigate economic, social, and traffic conflicts caused by the alignment of AALRT and road network, suggest solutions for each conflict investigated, and mitigate for the next LRT project to avoid conflicts. Scenario 1 considered railway and road networks combined, and scenario 2 considered roads without LRT. The parameters for social conflicts were: pedestrians waiting time to cross, pedestrians travelled distance to access the next crossing level, the walkway distance between the railway and road network, safety and security at the crossing level, waiting area before the crossing level, and peak hours effects. The economic conflict parameters were: business owners crossing for services, vehicle supplying goods access to shops, customers and business owners’ vehicles access to shops and Railway alignment contribution on business around, interviews and questionnaires have been delivered, and statistical package for social science (SPSS) has been used to analyse the respondents’ feedback in qualitative aspects and Excel for quantitative aspects.
After comparing the parameters of both scenarios, the following conflicts have been shown: long distance travelled to reach the crossing, long waiting time before crossing, insufficient walkway area between railway and road, insufficient security and safety signs at the crossing, difficulties of the vehicles to access shops and traffic congestion at turn bay. Solutions to the investigated conflicts are: to provide an inclusive pedestrian flyover bridge on every 150 m to 200 m of LRT and road network, to provide a walkway of 1.5 m width between railway and road, to install a signalling system at every crossing, to provide vehicles turn bay for freight vehicles and passengers’ vehicles on every 350 m of the systems which will make business easy and feasible. The future project must do a clear investigation during the planning phase; using tunnels and bridges to avoid alignment conflicts is better. The most cost-effective solution is constructing a turn bay that can be used as a zebra crossing and providing a signalling system at every turn bay. The other research can be focused on the design of suitable flyover bridges and turn bays.
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Keywords
Conflicts, traffic, economic impact, Business, Accessibility, Crossing, turn bay