Use of Maximum Vehicle Delay to Characterize Signalized Intersection Performance

The average delay is a commonly used measure for characterizing the performance of signalized intersections. Current methods for estimating the average delay rely on models that are based on traffic volumes and green times. In practice, the development of such real-time measurements of delay is challenging because of the difficulty of accurately measuring vehicle arrivals and departures. However, measuring the waiting time after the first vehicle's arrival during the red interval can be an important performance measure for low- and moderate-volume conditions. The maximum waiting time provides an upper bound, or maximum, on individual vehicle delay during a given cycle and facilitates comparisons between different types of operation. This paper demonstrates the effectiveness of this performance measure—maximum vehicle delay—with four case studies.