Integrating GIS and Microscopic Traffic Simulation

to Analyze Impacts of Transportation

Infrastructure Construction
Hubo Cai, Ph.D., P.E., M.ASCE1; Jun-Seok Oh, Ph.D.2; and C. Y. David Yang, Ph.D.3
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Abstract: Infrastructure rehabilitation is critical to assuring the proper functioning of a nation’s transportation infrastructure. While the goal
of rehabilitation is typically to restore or improve the performance of the transportation system, the construction activity itself disrupts traffic
and worsens the already-congested transportation network with unsafe work zones. Traffic simulation models are becoming widely used in
evaluating such disruption in a controlled environment without physical implementation. Though rapid increase in computer processing
power has made microscopic simulation feasible, developing valid models is still a tedious and time-consuming task that is prone to errors.
This paper presents a study to automate development of microscopic traffic simulation models in a large-scale network by integrating the
geographic information system (GIS) and microscopic traffic simulation. This study adopted an integration approach and developed a frame-
work to combine GIS macro- and microscopic models. The developed framework was implemented in GIS to integrate a transportation GIS
system (TransCAD) and microscopic traffic modeling system (transportation analysis simulation systems, TRANSIMS). GIS tools for data
conversion and visualization were developed using geographic information system developer’s kit (GISDK). The system was tested in the
Southeast Michigan area to evaluate traffic impacts from the I-75/I-96 Ambassador Bridge Gateway Maintenance Project. The major con-
tribution of this study from the practitioners’ perspective is the grouping of GIS tools that automate data conversion and processing, visualize
model results, and compare simulation results with field observations in informational ways, thereby assisting in model development, cal-
ibration and validation, and results analysis. This study concluded that integration provided an efficient approach in developing valid micro-
scopic traffic simulation models. These user-friendly computer tools directly benefit transportation agencies that have developed regional
models in GIS and are transitioning to microscopic modeling. DOI: 10.1061/(ASCE)CP.1943-5487.0000136. © 2012 American Society of
Civil Engineers.
CE Database subject headings: Geographic information systems; Simulation; Traffic management; Infrastructure; Rehabilitation.
Author keywords: GIS; Traffic simulation; Microscopic simulation; Work zone; Integrated GIS; Infrastructure rehabilitation.

Background
Highway transportation infrastructure consisting of roads and
bridges has a life cycle. When put in service, it ages and deterio-
rates, leading to construction activities aiming at restoring and
maintaining its functionality. The National Academy of Engineer-
ing (NAE) recently listed “Restoring and Improving Urban Infra-
structure” as one of the Grand Challenges of Engineering in the
21st century (NAE 2008). The Federal Highway Administration
(FHwA) has reported that a large number of bridges and roads
are either structurally deficient or functionally obsolete (BTS
1
Assistant Professor, Division of Construction Engineering and Man-
agement, School of Civil Engineering, Purdue Univ., 550 Stadium Mall
Drive, West Lafayette, IN 47907 (corresponding author). E-mail:
hubocai@purdue.edu
2 on the availability and quality of input data. Whereas a rapid in-
Associate Professor, Dept. of Civil and Construction Engineering,
Western Michigan Univ., Kalamazoo, MI 49008-5316. E-mail: jun.oh@
wmich.edu
3 tedious and time-consuming task that is prone to errors. A method
Highway Research Engineer, Turner-Fairbank Highway Research
Center, FHWA, U.S. DOT, 6300 Georgetown Pike, HRDO-20, McLean,
VA 22101. E-mail: david.yang@dot.gov
Note. This manuscript was submitted on December 17, 2010; approved
on May 19, 2011; published online on June 15, 2012. Discussion period
open until December 1, 2012; separate discussions must be submitted for
individual papers. This paper is part of the Journal of Computing in Civil
Engineering, Vol. 26, No. 4, July 1, 2012. ©ASCE, ISSN 0887-3801/
2012/4-478–487/$25.00.
2009a, 2009b; FHWA 2009). This suggests that a large number
of construction activities will persist, putting the entire nation into
a “work-zone.”
Construction activities of transportation infrastructure lead to
lane closures and work zones that disrupt traffic and worsen
already-congested highways (Abudayyeh et al. 2010; Adeli and
Samanwoy 2004). Traffic simulation models provide a tool to
evaluate the effects of various construction activities and work-zone
strategies to make informed decisions without implementing them
(Stirzaker and Dia 2007). Microscopic simulation models provide
an environment in which various scenarios could be introduced and
evaluated in a controlled context without physical implementation
and road traffic disruption. Consequently, they are gaining in pop-
ularity. Microsimulation is a computationally intensive approach
with a high level of modeling detail. Model accuracy depends
crease in computer processing power has made it technically fea-
sible, the development of valid microscopic simulation models is a
is needed to automate data conversion and processing tasks, with
the goal of converting existing road network data into a format that
can serve as the backbone for microscopic simulation modeling. In
addition to data conversion, efficient visualization methods are
needed to display simulation results, field observations, and the
underlying road network in an informational way to not only ana-
lyze model results, but also validate and calibrate models.

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 This paper presents a pilot study that addresses the aforemen-
tioned issues in microscopic modeling. The study took an integra-
tion approach to combine regional travel demand modeling and
microscopic traffic simulation modeling into a single system on a
geographical information system (GIS) platform. The major con-
tribution of this work is an integration framework with a group
of computer tools to automate data conversion and processing.
These tools greatly reduce the time and efforts in developing a mi-
cromodel by using the existing road network data of a typical
regional planning model. The integration framework is also asso-
ciated with a group of visualization tools to graphically analyze
model results and assist in model validation and as well as calibra-
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tion by comparing simulation results with field observations.
The rest of this paper is organized into sections of a brief intro-
duction to agent-based, microscopic traffic simulation with identi-
fied challenges; a summary of previous model integration studies;
the integration methodology of this study; the system implementa-
tion and its test in a case study, as well as a summary and
conclusions.
Agent-Based, Microscopic Traffic Simulation
Agent-based modeling (ABM) views a system as a collection of
autonomous decision-making entities (agents) that interact with
each other and behave appropriately according to preset rules,
leading to relatively stable, aggregated, macroscopic patterns
(Bonabeau 2002; Srbljinović and Škunca 2003; North and Macal
2007). ABM is a bottom-up approach. Its benefit lies in its capa-
bilities of capturing emergent phenomena (i.e., the whole system’s
patterns resulting from individual interactions), describing a system
naturally, and flexibility (North and Macal 2007).
Traffic flow simulation is an obvious application of ABM.
A regional transportation network is modeled as a system that is
composed of a detailed road network, travelers, as well as the in-
teractions among travelers and road infrastructure. Among such
simulation tools is the transportation analysis simulation systems
(TRANSIMS), a microscopic traffic simulation package developed
at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL). TRANSIMS is a cel-
lular automata approach with several characteristics of ABM,
though whether it is a genuine ABM is still under debate. In TRAN-
SIMS, all vehicles are modeled as agents (or proto-agents since
they have rules to change their behavior, but no rules to change
rules) (North and Macal 2007). These proto-agents determine their
movement on a grid of road surface based on the cells, availability
and relationship with neighboring proto-agents. TRANSIMS esti-
mates the travel demand of a synthetic population based on its daily
activity patterns, simulates the movement of individual vehicles on
a regional road network, analyzes the network performance, and
estimates air pollution emission generated by the movements
(Bonabeau 2002). TRANSIMS helps plan trips to satisfy travel
needs, assign trips to routes, and create a microsimulation of all
persons, vehicles, as well as resulting traffic on a large-scale road
network (AEMCOM 2007). TRANSIMS models can forecast how
changes in transportation infrastructure might affect those activities
and trips. Because infrastructure construction disrupts traffic by al-
tering the infrastructure for a certain time period, TRANSIMS can
evaluate its impacts and compare traffic management strategies
based on their impacts. The benefits of agent-based microscopic
simulation are obvious in terms of better system throughput and
emission compliance (Bonabeau 2002).
A practical challenge in microscopic traffic simulation modeling
is model development, especially for a large-scale road network.
Microscopic traffic models require very detailed road network data;
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collecting and processing such data is tedious and time-consuming.
Another practical issue is the lack of tools in existing simulation
packages to visually assist in model calibration and validation,
as well as results analysis. The work presented in this paper in-
cludes tools to automate data processing, visually detect discrep-
ancies between simulation results and field observations, as well as
visualize and graphically analyze simulation results to derive mean-
ingful findings.
Related Traffic Model Integration Studies
Recognizing the existence of regional travel demand models de-
veloped by metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) and
state departments of transportation (DOTs) across the nation
as well as the usefulness of data from these models in micro-
scopic modeling to save data collection cost, transportation re-
searchers have conducted a number of studies to integrate
microscopic and macroscopic models. Early work by Alexiadis
et al. (1994) developed a framework to combine a macromodel
with a more detailed meso model by including intelligent trans-
portation systems (ITS) in the planning stage and generating de-
tailed travel time information. Montero et al. (1998, 2001) and
Siegel and Coeymans (2005) used a macromodel to generate sub-
area matrices for detailed analysis in a traffic simulator (generic
environment for traffic analysis and modeling/advanced interac-
tive microscopic simulation for urban and non-urban networks,
GETRAM/AIMSUN). Mitretek Systems (1999) employed a
similar method to integrate a macromodel with the meso model
(INTEGRATION). Burghout et al. (2005) discussed the require-
ments for the development of a meso-micro integration frame-
work and developed a prototype hybrid model to integrate
microscopic traffic simulator (MITSIMLab, a micromodel) as
well as a meso simulation model (Mezzo). Oh et al. (2000) and
Sahraoui and Jayakrishnan (2005) presented a hybrid simulation
framework to integrate the Paramics microscopic model with the
routing and behavior response simulation schemes in the dy-
namic network assignment-simulation model for advanced road-
way telematics (DYNASMART) macroscopic model. Rousseau
et al. (2008) developed a framework to integrate a regional plan-
ning model with microscopic simulation in the Atlanta area.
These studies concluded that integration is the optimal approach
to use the best features of existing models, rather than developing a
new transportation model. They revealed the critical importance of
correct and detailed road data in microscopic models, as well as the
great utility of GIS technology in data management. Several re-
searchers also pointed out the lack of visualization tools in existing
microsimulation to graphically assist in model validation and cal-
ibration, as well as results analysis.
Integration Method
Traffic studies are data-driven tasks and usually involve many spa-
tial datasets. Typical among them are road network, traffic control
devices, traffic analysis zones (TAZs), and trips. In the United
States, many municipalities and state DOTs have regional models
developed upon the platform of transportation GIS. To utilize such
data in a microscopic model such as TRANSIMS, data conversion
is required. Table 1 provides a summary comparison between a
GIS-based regional travel forecasting model and a microscopic traf-
fic simulation model.
Recognizing the availability and usability of required spatial
datasets in the GIS format as well as the capacity of GIS to
manage spatial data, graphically display road network and
 Table 1. Summary of Model Comparison
Model Regional travel forecasting model Microscopic traffic simulation model
Platform TransCAD TRANSIMS
Network Includes all functional classes of roadways Includes all functional classes of roadways
Traffic control Not considered Included
Trip generation Zone centroid Activity locations specified within zone
O-D trip tables Generated with aggregation at peak period interval Includes origin, destination, start time
Traffic assignment Deterministic and static user equilibrium Stochastic and dynamic feedback through iterative dynamic assignment
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multidimensional summary traffic data, and conduct aggregate
travel demand modeling, this study developed an integration frame-
work illustrated in Fig. 1 to combine GIS and microscopic models.
The GIS and microscopic simulation system under combination
were TransCAD (a transportation GIS package) and TRANSIMS.
The design philosophies were (1) to utilize existing functionality
of TRANSIMS and TransCAD to the maximum extent; and
(2) to design a generic integration framework to work with
typical regional planning macro- and microscopic models beside
TRANSIMS models.
The framework presented in Fig. 1 consists of three compo-
nents, namely, Network Conversion, Simulation & Network Equi-
librium, and TRANSIMS Visualization. Textboxes with thick and
black boundaries and bold, italic texts represent existing modules
from TRANSIMS. Textboxes with thick and black boundaries and
bold texts represent newly developed modules to fill in the gaps in
integrating GIS and micro models.
The overall procedure starts with Network Conversion to pro-
cess TransCAD data (macromodel data). The processed data are fed
into the Simulation & Network Equilibrium to obtain simulation
results. Simulation results and field observations are processed
and imported into a database and visualization tools are then
applied to graphically compare simulation results to field observa-
tions for model validation and calibration and to graphically ana-
lyze model results to evaluate infrastructure construction impacts
and make informed decisions about work-zone traffic management
and lane closure strategies. A number of feedback routes (repre-
sented by dashed, arrowed lines) are also available. This integration
design greatly facilitates the development of microscopic models
before, during, and after infrastructure construction activities.
The comparison of before—and during-construction models shall
reveal the impacts from infrastructure construction.
Network Conversion
The Network Conversion component aims at processing the road
network data of a macromodel in TransCAD and traffic control in-
formation in various formats to render them ready for TRANSIMS
simulation. Completing this component leads to complete and de-
tailed road network data including road network and traffic control
device data, activity and parking locations, as well as lane connec-
tivity. The road network consists of links and nodes. A road link has
a set of properties such as number of traffic lanes, traffic capacity,
speed limit, and road classification. The traffic control device data

TransCAD Validate/Edit
TRANSIMS Modules
Road Network, TAZ
TRANSIMS Simulation Results
TransCAD2Net Link Performance Data
5- or 15-minute Interval
Generic Network
Simulation & Network Equilibrium
Node, Link, Zone, Shape
TRANSIMS Link Node File TransCAD Road
TransimsNet

TRANSIMS Network Preprocess Tools

Node, Link, Shape, Activity
Location, Parking, Process Link Lookup Table Hourly Performance
Lane, Lane Connectivity Data
Sign & Signal Warrants

Import Tools
IntControl

Traffic Control Files Traffic

Unsignalized & Signalized Node, Database
Timing Plan, Phasing Plan,
Detector, Signal Coordinator
Visualization Tools
ArcNet
TransCAD
24-Hour Volume/Speed Table/Chart,
ArcView Shape Files Scale-Symbol & Color Thematic,
Intermediate Visualization/Display 24-Hour Volume Animation

Network Conversion TRANSIMS Visualization

Fig. 1. Framework to integrate macroscopic TransCAD and microscopic TRANSIMS models

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 refer to the locations of traffic signs and signals, types, as well as
signal timing, phasing, and coordination information.
Typical regional planning models have GIS road data in a link-
node format, but very limited traffic sign and signal data in GIS.
Most MPOs and state DOTs have some sign and signal data in non-
GIS forms such as database tables, spreadsheets, or plain textfiles.
On the other hand, TRANSIMS has two modules, namely,
TransimsNet and IntControl, which take link-node format road data
as inputs and generates complete TRANSIMS road network data
with control parameters in control files.
It is obvious that there is a gap between the GIS road data and
the generic link-node format road data that can directly serve as
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The TRANSIMS Visualization component in Fig. 2 contains
three groups of tools: PreProcess Tools, Import Tools, and Visuali-
zation Tools. The PreProcess Tools aggregate TRANSIMS perfor-
mance into hourly statistics and generate a lookup table to match
TRANSIMS links to TransCAD links. The Import Tools bring the
aggregated TRANSIMS performance and field observations into a
traffic database. The Visualization Tools display TRANSIMS per-
formance data, field observations, and the comparisons between
them by means of tables, charts, thematic maps, and animation.
The tables and charts enable users to investigate the 24-hour per-
formance of individual links in detail, whereas the thematic maps
and animation provide a graphical view of the entire network

inputs to TRANSIMS modules. There is also no mechanism to pro- performance.

cess the limited traffic sign and signal data, check and validate the
TRANSIMS-generated sign and signal data against them, and cal-
ibrate control parameters if possible. To fill in these gaps, a new System Implementation and Case Study
module/toolset entitled “TransCAD2Net” is proposed to process
the GIS road data of a typical regional travel demand model and, The designed framework in Fig. 2 was implemented on the plat-
when combined with TRANSIMS modules, convert them into a form TransCAD, using its scripting language of Geographic Infor-
TRANSIMS-ready format. mation System Developer’s Kit (GISDK), to integrate GIS and
TRANSIMS. The implemented system was tested in the Southeast
Simulation & Network Equilibrium Michigan area.
This component primarily consists of TRANSIMS modules of
TripPlan, PlanSum, Router, and MicroSimulator. It adopts a trip- Case Study
based approach (Fig. 2) to process the trip data of a macromodel.
Resulting travel activities are then placed on a detailed road net- The study area chosen to test the system implementation was the
work to simulate the movement of individual vehicles based on Detroit metropolitan area in southeast Michigan. Like other MPOs,
their behavior/interactions (agent-based approach), as well as to the Southeast Michigan Council of Government (SEMCOG) has
evaluate the network performance in terms of volumes and developed travel demand forecasting models for the Great Detroit
speeds per link and intersection, vehicle hours, and vehicles miles. area in TransCAD. This area covers 4.9 million residents and
The movement of individual vehicles is also tracked and can be 1.9 million households of seven counties, 1505 TAZs. The road
reported. network in Fig. 3 contains 23,110 links connected by 15,222 nodes.
The SEMCOG model has origin-destination (OD) trip matrices
TRANSIMS Visualization by vehicle types for four time periods in a day (morning peak,
TRANSIMS reports vehicle movements and network performance
in textfiles. Advanced visualization tools are needed to display
such results to assist in deriving meaningful findings and convey
these findings in a user-friendly manner. TRANSIMS visualization
requirements can be categorized into visualization of: (1) the
TRANSIMS network; (2) TRANSIMS link and intersection perfor-
mance results; (3) comparisons between model results and field
observations; and (4) the movement of individual vehicles. Re-
quirement (1) is straightforward and can be realized by converting
TRANSIMS network into GIS format and displaying in GIS. Ani-
mation packages such as Network EXplorer for Traffic Analysis,
NEXTA) can view vehicle-based TRANSIMS simulation results to
meet requirement (4). The Visualization component in this study
addresses visualization requirements (2) and (3). It visualizes
model results and comparisons between model results and field ob-
servations. Thus, it not only assists in analyzing model results, but
also detects discrepancies between model results and field obser-
vations to form a basis for model validation and calibration.

TransCAD Trip Matrix Travel Counts Data

Production/Attraction Split Diurnal Distribution Data

Export Matrix Data Smoothing
Integer Value Trip Table Smoothed Distribution Curve

ConvertTrips Activity Locations & Weighting

Activity File Vehicle File Population File

Fig. 2. Processing macromodel trip data Fig. 3. SEMCOG network by facility type

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 Contract 2 – 2003-04 completed
Contract 4 – 2007-10
Contract 3 – 2005-0
in construction
Contract 5 – 2009
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Contract 1 – 2003 completed
Fig. 4. Construction phasing plan of the Gateway project
afternoon peak, and two off-peak time periods). Person trips are
classified into six trip purposes. Combing commercial vehicle trips
and external trips, the total number of trips is 19,042,460.
Fig. 5. Interface of TransCAD2Net
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The infrastructure construction activity under investigation is
the I-75/I-96 Ambassador Bridge Gateway Maintenance Project
with its construction phasing plan illustrated in Fig. 4. The Ambas-
sador Bridge in southwest Detroit connects Detroit and Windsor,
Canada. It ranks as the busiest commercial crossing on the
U.S.-Canada border. During the reconstruction of the Ambassador
Gateway area, the I-75 mainline and I-75/I-96 system interchange
are simultaneously closed for months. The work-zone closure sce-
nario includes complete closure of I-75 near the Ambassador
Bridge area and the I-75/I-96 system interchange. The implemented
system was applied toward the development of TRANSIMS mod-
els before and during construction to evaluate the traffic impacts.
System Implementation
Network Conversion Tools
The main purpose of the Network Conversion component is to pro-
cess the available road network data into a RANSIMS network. A
network conversion tool entitled TransCAD2Net has been devel-
oped to achieve this purpose. It converts a road network of a macro-
model in GIS format into a generic TRANSIMS link-node format
that includes three mandatory text files (Link, Node, and Zone) and
one optional text file (Shape). Fig. 5 shows the interface of this tool
when applied to the macroscopic model in the Detroit area of Mich-
igan. It allows users to identify source data and attributes to match
target data as well as attributes, and assign default values to missing
attributes. All tasks of coordinate system conversion (TRANSIMS
requires Universal Transverse Mercator, UTM, coordinate system),
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Fig. 6. Snapshots of TransCAD2Net output textfiles

matching road functional classifications, and setting external zones
and zonal connectors are automated. Fig. 6 provides a snapshot of
the essential outputs of TransCAD2Net, i.e., three text files that
represent links, nodes, and zones of a generic link-node format road
network, which can be used by TRANSIMS and other microscopic
models.
In addition to data conversion, the research team has also sup-
plemented TransCAD2Net with network correcting tools to ensure
the accuracy of the resulting road network. For instance, a network
correction tool checks the locations and properties of signs and sig-
nals against existing inventories. Detected errors are reported so
that control parameters can be modified or tuned. Similarly, lane
connectivity information is compared to the turn prohibition infor-
mation in the macromodel for cross-checking. This procedure can
be repeated until satisfactory results are reached. Fig. 7 provides an
example of activity locations being assigned to wrong TAZs with a
user interface of the network correction tool that detects and cor-
rects such errors. By default, TRANSIMS modules assign all ac-
tivity locations to their nearest zone centroids. Since traffic analysis
zones are irregularly shaped with varying dimension and size, many
activity locations in Fig. 7 should belong to zone 918, but were
associated to incorrect zones of 914 and 917. A polygon-based GIS
approach was implemented to detect and correct such errors auto-
matically. Fig. 8 shows the complete TRANSIMS road network
data of a portion of the case study area after correction and
validation.
Visualization Tools
The visualization tools serve two main purposes of (1) displaying
field observations and simulation results in forms of tables, bar
charts, and theme maps, and (2) graphically comparing simulation
results to field observations to validate and calibrate the micro-
scopic model. Prior to displaying simulation results, field observa-
tions, and comparisons between the two, both simulation results
and field observations are processed by the Preprocess Tools. These
tools aggregate TRANSIMS simulation results of various time in-
tervals (5- and 15-min, for example) and field observations (traffic
monitoring sensors data) into hourly performance data. More

Fig. 7. Example of network correction tool to correct activity location errors

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 “mode switch” drop down lists, one for switching to single traffic
data source mode and the other for switching to comparison mode.
The last row contains three buttons to control the animation and a
textbox to display the current time period. Fig. 10 presents sample
results of applying the visualization tools to graphically analyze the
simulation results and the comparisons between field observations
and model results.
TransCAD has built-in capabilities of displaying geographic
features using symbols and styles that can be customized by feature
attributes. For instance, thicker and red lines can be used to re-
present roads with higher traffic volume. TransCAD can also dis-
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TRANSIMS Network play the associated attributes for features of interest in tabular
Parking format. Compared to the built-in visualization capabilities available
Activity Location in TransCAD, the visualization tools developed in this study enable
Node
Link with Flow Direction
users to display roads using prespecified consistent color and scale
Process Link mechanisms as illustrated in Fig. 10(c), and thus allow detection of
Lane Connectivity traffic patterns throughout the day. They also allow the comparison
Pocket Lane
of field observation and simulation results for a single road segment
Fig. 8. Portion of the complete TRANSIMS road network in the study in tabular and chart formats. The animation tools differ from the
area built-in animation capability of TransCAD in the aspect of “anima-
tion frames”. Generation the built-in capabilities of animation in
TransCAD require that animation frames be created before visuali-
zation and thus, the approach can be viewed as static. The anima-
importantly, since TRANSIMS simulation results are registered to tion tools developed in this study generate animation frames on-fly.
TRANSIMS road network and field observations are registered to Real time updates on the traffic volume are reflected in the anima-
the original road network, a lookup table is dynamically created by tion and thus, these tools adopt a dynamic approach.
the Preprocess Tools to link and match road segments and inter-
sections in both networks. Resulting hourly performance data Simulation Outputs
are then imported into a traffic database by the Import Tools,
With the data processed using the network conversion tool, the
relying on the matching mechanism specified in the lookup table.
Detroit TRANSIMS model was developed. Traffic volumes and
This design enables the flexibility of independently updating
speeds were compared observations and traffic pattern changes
TRANSIMS results and field observations.
were investigated. Fig. 11 depicts a comparison of traffic volume
Once all traffic data are in the traffic database, they can be dis-
at a freeway section as an example. Both Scenario 1 and 2 simu-
played in GIS. Fig. 9 illustrates the user interface of the visualiza-
lation models follow the 24-h travel pattern, as observed in the field
tion tools. It contains seven tools on the first row with their
with morning and afternoon peaks, and therefore assists in model
functionality outlined in Table 2. The second and third rows are
verification. Scenario 2 results are closer to field observations than
Scenario 1; therefore, the Scenario 2 model shall be adopted over
Scaled-Symbol the Scenario 1 model. Fig. 12 shows flow pattern changes of I-75
Color Theme Theme southbound traffic forced to divert during the highway construction
Animation-Ready
Bar Chart
Line Chart
period. Before construction, I-75 Southbound exhibited a heavy
Table
Comparison Table traffic load indicated by the thick shade. During construction, a
Single data source mode large portion of the traffic on I-75 Southbound was forced to take
Stop animation Comparison mode I-94 instead as indicated by the thicker shade on I-94 and thinner
Pause animation
Start animation Display time period shade on I-75. This observation confirms the model validity as the
change of traffic pattern conforms to the expectation of closing the
Fig. 9. User interface of the visualization tools
ramp of I-94 and M-10. Furthermore, it quantifies the change in
terms of the increase and decrease of traffic on I-94 and I-75.

Table 2. Summary of Visualization Tools

Tool Usage
Table Display a single source of traffic data in a tabular format, for a particular link
Bar chart Display a single source of traffic data in a bar chart format, for a particular link
Color theme Display a single source of traffic data using color themes, for all links
Scaled-symbol theme Display a single source of traffic data using scaled-symbols, for all links
Animation-ready Initialize the animation
Line chart Compare the traffic data from two sources for a particular link, and display the results in a line chart
Comparison table Compare the traffic data from two sources for a particular link, and display the results in a tabular format
Animation controls Control the animation, i.e., Start, Pause, and Stop

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Fig. 10. Sample results of applying visualization tools

Fig. 11. Example of traffic volume comparison

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 Ramp Closed for Mitigation
(I-94 and M-10)
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Work Zone (I-75 Southbound)
(a)
Fig. 12. Traffic pattern for those forced to detour due to the work-zone
Summary and Conclusions
This study developed a framework to integrate macroscopic and
microscopic traffic models to automate data conversion and
processing in developing microscopic traffic simulation models
using macroscopic model data. The framework was implemented
on the platform of TransCAD with two main toolsets, one for net-
work conversion and the other for visualization. The implemented
prototype was tested in the Detroit area of Michigan. The network
conversion toolset enables transportation modelers to efficiently de-
rive a TRANSIMS road network from a macroscopic model. The
visualization toolset allows transportation modelers to graphically
view field observations, simulation results, and the comparisons
between them. Doing so provides a graphical means to not only
view traffic condition, but also to assist in model validation and
calibration. The developed tools are flexible enough with default
settings and customization mechanisms. They automate a large por-
tion of the model development task by providing tools to process
road and traffic data from a macromodel.
In conclusion, the framework designed and implemented in this
study automates the data conversion and processing task and facil-
itates the development of an agent-based, microscopic model from
a macroscopic, regional model. It greatly reduces effort in model
development, validation, calibration, and results analysis. As illus-
trated in the Case Study and Figs. 10–12, the developed visualiza-
tion tools allow users to visually compare simulation results with
field observations to verify and validate the model, and to visually
detect and appreciate the changes in traffic pattern caused by work
zones. It benefits the adoption of TRANSIMS by transportation
agencies that have developed regional models in TransCAD and
are in the transition from macroscopic to microscopic modeling.
The integration approach of this study allows the coexistence of
macroscopic and microscopic models as well as a smooth transition
between them when needed. Lessons learned in this study will
greatly benefit researchers of the traffic modeling and GIS
communities.
Future study directions in integrating macroscopic and micro-
scopic models are (1) expanding the applicable macro models to
platforms other than TransCAD, (2) enhancing model-calibration-
oriented visualization tools and strengthening their roles in model
validation and calibration, as well as (3) integrating GIS visualiza-
tion tools and specific visualization tools, such as NEXTA and
METROPOLIS.
486 / JOURNAL OF COMPUTING IN CIVIL ENGINEERING © ASCE / JULY/AUGUST 2012
J. Comput. Civ. Eng. 2012.26:478-487.
(b)
Acknowledgments
The authors are grateful to the Federal Highway Administration
(FHWA) for funding this study through FHWA Contract No.
DTFH61-08-C-00019. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or re-
commendations expressed in this material are those of the authors
and do not necessarily reflect the views of Purdue University,
Western Michigan University, or FHWA.
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