For this assignment, the analysis was focused on Shaw and Woodrow intersection found close to the Fresno State Recreation Center. In comparison to Woodrow, a two-way two lane, Shaw was found to be much busier because it is an Arterial highway. I began the intersection analysis at 5.00 pm, which is considered as the peak hour. Indifferent to what I expected, the highway tended to be much louder. This can serve as the basis of little to no housing found off the highway. Most of the traffic were heading east bound on the highway approaching 168 freeway.
The direction taken by Shaw is East and West with featured protected left turns. However, Woodrow heads North and South with no protection to all of the turns. This made me much cynical concerning the Woodrow efficiency because I assumed that too large queue could result from the backing up of the cars turning left. I found this assumption to be wrong given that at the end of the analyzed phase, there was depletion of the whole queue.
It took 2 minutes to complete the total cycle. The slight deviation was only 8 seconds and this can be contributed to number of people found to be turning left on the northbound and southbound Woodrow. In the case of much queue, the time for cycle completion was closer to 2 minutes; however, with a lot queue the cycle went to about 2 minutes and 10 seconds. The following is a list of the recorded cycle length:
Lap 2: 01:58.78
Lap 3: 02:02.98
Lap 4: 02:13.91
Lap 5: 02:00.83
I would define Shaw’s left protected turning as partially actuated because they are both controlled by pneumatic tubes and also partially timed. The through traffic therein appears to be timed and this can be attributed to the large numbers of cars found in queue; the large numbers cause time out. In the other case of Woodrow, it was partially actuated with a gap out whenever the queue was depleted.
With the above discussion, I can conclude that the intersection featuring Woodrow is much efficient. However, Shaw was a victim of backing up of large queue almost to the previous stop light. The case with Shaw is the result of intersection found at Shaw and Chestnut besides the backup resulting from the onramp getting on to the 168 FREEWAY. I believe that the base designed for the intersection is better and by making the through light of Shaw at Chestnut more efficient, the light would be fully sufficient.
Shaw and Woodrow Intersection
Dimension estimates for the above drawing come from Google Maps.
Phase Diagram
Shaw and Woodrow is a three phase intersection.
