Overview
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Overview, Introduction, and Getting Started
Krome Avenue is a 33-mile, north-south route that bypasses Miami, Florida, on the west side. It is essentially a rural route that has very little roadside development. Florida’s Turnpike is about 5 miles to the east, providing several east-west connections to Krome Avenue. Its two-lane configuration has limited capacity compared to other facilities such as freeways and multilane roadways. Most of the route now operates well within its capacity, except that some congestion has been observed at critical locations. This is a region of high population growth that is expected to generate continually increasing traffic volumes. Prompted primarily by safety considerations, the posted speeds have already been reduced below the 55 mph level typically found on open highways.
In this case study, identify the goals, objectives and analysis tools for an investigation of the existing level of service on the entire route. We will then apply the analysis tools to assess the current performance of this route and identify areas that are deficient. Then, applying the same analysis tools, we will investigate some alternatives for mitigating the deficiencies.
The main purpose of the case study is to illustrate the concepts and practice of applying the transportation analysis tools in general and the Highway Capacity Manual (HCM) in particular. Much of the discussion will be based on a recently completed study of Krome Avenue that had similar goals and objectives. Several problems will be presented to illustrate the application of the tools and the interpretation of the results.
Krome Avenue is an actual highway and the data used in the problems represent actual field data. In some cases the alternative intersection improvements discussed in this case study were chosen for their illustrative value and do not necessarily reflect the recommendations of the original study.