Review of suitable parameters and methodologies to delineate the traffic impact area from a proposed development in Sri Lankan context

Abstract

An upcoming development usually generates both vehicles in and out to the accessible and adjacent roads and junctions. Therefore, most countries have adopted different planning and building regulations and guidelines to manage them in advance. Although, there is a vast positive movement in guidelines in Sri Lanka as well, still doubtful areas could be observed in delineating the traffic impact area properly. A 500m buffer area from the proposed site is currently taken as the minimum study area at developing the traffic impact assessments which is mentioned under the Term of Reference (TOR) in Sri Lanka. The geographical extent of the traffic impact area is not a fixed boundary, which could be changed especially based on varieties of parameters. Therefore, a fixed boundary may misdirect the developers, consultants and planning authorities at the decision making in transport planning circumstances. Thus, many studies have gone wrong due this very subjective selection. Therefore, many scholars in the transportation field and its allied disciplines argue the importance of developing suitable parameters and methods to delineate the traffic impact area for each development uniquely. Only a few number of models, techniques, and algorithms would be observed on this subject from present assessments. Hence, the objective of this research is to review relevant methods and parameters from past studies and to select the most suitable parameters and methods for delineating the traffic impact areas for proposed developments in the Sri Lankan context. Most suitable parameters and methodologies were identified through the Snowballing technique and multi-criteria analysis for delineating the extent of the traffic impact area from a new development