The Impact of Truck Platooning on Traffic Flow Considering Bridge Safety Index

Truck platooning has the potential to revolutionize freight transportation by enhancing traffic flow and fuel efficiency. However, as the truck platoons roll out, they will be disruptive to the safety of existing highway bridges. This study focuses on addressing these concerns and ensuring the safe passage of platoons across bridges while examining their impact on traffic flow. To accomplish this challenge, the study proposes a novel method that utilizes the bridge safety index to search for the optimal configuration to operate truck platoons. The performance of the bridge safety and traffic flow with truck platoons is evaluated with microscopic traffic simulation. The evaluation indicates that reducing the space headway between vehicles and increasing the platoon size can improve bridge traffic flow rates. Additionally, the study highlights the influence of speed on traffic flow, revealing that increasing the speed generally improves traffic flow, except when it reaches 70 km/h. Considering the limitations of bridge safety, the optimal traffic flow can be increased by up 124% when compared with the roads without platooning and bridges. This emphasizes the substantial impact that truck platooning has on the dynamics of traffic flow.