Evaluation of the microscopic behavior of motorcycle taxis by adapting the SSAM model at an urban intersection

The excessive increase in the use of motorcycle taxis as a means of urban transport in developing cities has increased vehicular congestion, delays, and conflicts. This occurs because the public transport system is inefficient and generates the appearance of this mode of informal transport. The behavior of this vehicle is atypical, as it has different dimensions and has greater freedom to maneuver through traffic. This includes the generation of two queues per lane, driving against or making unexpected turns. In addition, the little road education of its drivers leads to not "give way." Consequently, the microscopic representation of the mototaxi is imprecise. For this reason, this article evaluates the microscopic behavior in VISSIM and the application of SSAM in an intersection where the mototaxi represents 54% of the entire vehicular composition. The city of Pucallpa-Peru was selected, where this vehicle gradually became the main mode of transportation. For the investigation, the capacity of the intersection, the vehicular flow, and the trajectories of the mototaxi were collected as field information. For a correct characterization of the operational behavior of motorcycle taxis, a calibrated and validated simulation was used. Here it was possible to identify the types and number of conflicts, the collision time, the time after the invasion and the angle of rotation. The results showed that there are 22 critical conflict points in the center of the intersection. In addition, this analysis allowed us to find the Wiedemann74 parameters, ax=0.45, bxadd = 0.14 and bxmult=0.27, which more accurately represent the operational behavior of the mototaxi.