CE 3025: Traffic Engineering Indian Institute of Technology Madras

CE 3025 Homework 1 Solutions

Pramesh Kumar prameshk@iitm.ac.in
Due Date: TBD, 2023 11:59 PM

Problem 1 Travel diary (8 pt)

Problem 2 Trip Generation (8 pt)
The number of trips originated from different zones can be calculated as (3 pt):

T1o = 80 + 0.2 ∗ 100 + 50 ∗ 0.2 + 0.2 ∗ 40 + 50 ∗ 1 = 168 (1)

T2o = 80 + 0.2 ∗ 200 + 20 ∗ 0.2 + 0.2 ∗ 75 + 50 ∗ 1 = 189 (2)
T1o = 80 + 0.2 ∗ 100 + 40 ∗ 0.2 + 0.2 ∗ 50 + 50 ∗ 0 = 118 (3)
The number of trips destined at different zones can be calculated as (3 pt):

T1d = 60 + 0.1 ∗ 100 + 50 ∗ 0.5 + 0.1 ∗ 40 + 50 ∗ 1 = 149 (4)

T2d = 60 + 0.1 ∗ 200 + 20 ∗ 0.5 + 0.1 ∗ 75 + 50 ∗ 1 = 148 (5)
T3d = 60 + 0.1 ∗ 100 + 40 ∗ 0.5 + 0.1 ∗ 50 + 50 ∗ 0 = 95 (6)
As number of trips generated from a zone is equal to trips destined to it, we can normalize it as following (2
pt):

Zone Trips Originated Trips Destined Normalized

1 168 149 149*(475/392) = 181
2 189 148 148*(475/392) = 179
3 118 95 95*(475/392) = 115
Total 475 392 475

Problem 3 Trip Distribution (8 pt)

Part(a)(2 pt) The travel time between each pair of zones is given as:

Zone j
MP SP
Zone i
MP 12 14
SP 15 12

Ti Tj
Trips from i to j can be calcuated as Tij = Ki Kj t3ij
. Let’s assume Ki = Kj = 1, we can calulate
different trips as following:

Pramesh Kumar: prameshk@iitm.ac.in 1

CE 3025: Traffic Engineering Indian Institute of Technology Madras

Table 1: Trip Distribution

MP SP
800 1500
MP 1100 1100*800/(123 ) = 509 1100*1500/(143 )=601
SP 1200 1200*800/(153 )=284 1200*1500/(123 )=1042
Kj 800/(509+284) = 1.01 1500/(601+1042)= 0.91

Part(b)(3 pt) As the column and row sums are not equal, we need to balance the matrix as following:

Table 2: Iteration 1

MP SP
800 1500 Ki
MP 1100 509*1.01 =514 601*0.91 = 547 1.04
SP 1200 284*1.01 =287 1042*0.91 = 948 0.97
Table 3: Iteration 2
Table 4: Iteration 3
MP SP
MP SP
800 1500
800 1500 Ki
MP 1100 514*1.04 = 533 547*1.04 = 567
MP 1100 524 576 1
SP 1200 287*0.97 = 279 948*0.97 =921
SP 1200 276 929 1
Kj 0.98 1.01
Table 5: Iteration 4

MP SP
800 1500
MP 1100 524 576
SP 1200 276 929
Kj 1 1

Part(c) (1 pt) We can calculate the new matrix as following:

MP SP
974 1730
MP 1265 524*1.05 = 550 576*1.05 = 605
SP 1385 276*1.05 = 290 929*1.05 = 975

Part(d) (2 pt) Assuming TM P,M P = a, we can write the equations as:

TM P,M P = a
TM P,SP = 1100 − a
TSP,M P = 800 − a
TSP,SP = 1200 − (800 − a) − a = 400 − 2a
By assuming any value of a, you can get multiple solutions for this system of linear equations. So, there is
no unique solution to this set of equations as the inverse of matrix is not defined. If you increase the size
of matrix to 3 × 3, then you will have six equations and 9 unknowns (also known as ill-posed) and we need
some extra information to solve such problems. One way to solve the problem in that case is to write this as
an optimization problem (which optimizes some objective) with equality constraints. In this way, you can
convert this into an unconstrained problem and get extra set of equations to get a unique solution.

Note: Student should we awarded full credit if she figured out that the system of equations has no unique
solution

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CE 3025: Traffic Engineering Indian Institute of Technology Madras

Problem 4 Mode Choice (8 pt)

Part (a) (1 pt)

Part (b) (5 pt) The disutility of each mode can be calculated as following:

VA = − 0.46 − 0.35 ∗ 20 − 0.08 ∗ 8 − 0.005 ∗ 320 = −9.7 (7)

VT = − 0.07 − 0.35 ∗ 30 − 0.08 ∗ 6 − 0.005 ∗ 100 = −11.55 (8)
(9)

The probability of each mode is:

expVA exp−11.55
PA = = = 0.86 (10)
expVA + expVT exp−11.55 + exp−9.7
expVT exp−9.7
PT = = = 0.14 (11)
expVA + expVT exp−11.55 + exp−9.7
(12)

Part (c) (1 pt) The number of students commuting by auto mode = 0.86*300 = 258 and by transit = 300
-258 = 42

Part (d) (1 pt) An increase in fuel prices will lead to new utilities but not new mode shares. This is because
the difference between VA and VT did not change.

Problem 5 Traffic Assignment (6 pt)

(a) (3 pt) Under User Equilibrium, all used paths connecting an OD pair have equal and minimum travel
time. Let us start by loading all the demand on local route, i.e. xl = 100.

tl = 40 + xl = 40 + 100 = 140 minutes, which is more than the time spent on the transit route. So let
us try adding another path and calculate the flows.
– Transit and local 40 + xl = 50 =⇒ xl = 10, and xt = 90, xh = 0. However, th = 20 < tt

– Transit and Highway path 20 + 0.005x2h = 50 =⇒ xh = 77.45 and xt = 100 − 77.45 but
tl = 40 < 50.
– Local and Highway 20 + 0.005x2h = 40 + xl =⇒ 20 + 0.005x2h = 40 + 100 − xh =⇒ xh = 84.4
and xl = 100 − 84.4 = 15.6. Again, th = 55.6 > tt .
Using any of the above combinations, UE is not achieved. So, we need to try all three paths as following.

40 + xl = 50 =⇒ xl = 10
√
20 + 0.005x2h = 50 =⇒ xh = 6000 = 77
xt = 100 − 77 − 10 = 13

As you can see that the travel time on all paths is equal, hence UE is achieved. The toal system travel
time is, T ST TU E = 10*(40+10) + 50*13 + 77*(20 + 0.005*(772 )) = 5000 vehicle-minutes.

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CE 3025: Traffic Engineering Indian Institute of Technology Madras

(b) (2 pt) For SO, we can calculate the objective function by just multiplying the travel time fucntions
with the link flows
SO

f (xl , xt , xh ) = xl ∗ (40 + xl ) + (50) ∗ xt + xh ∗ (20 + 0.005x2h ) = 40xl + x2l + 50xt + 20xh + 0.005x3h

minimize 40xl + x2l + 50xt + 20xh + 0.005x3h

xl ,xh ,xt

subject to xl + xt + xh = 100 (13)

xl , xt , xh ≥ 0

(d) (1 pt) One of the limitation of using BPR function is given below:
– BPR function can take flow (xa ) more than capacity (ca ) which is unrealistic.

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