Abstract:
Traffic on the roads is on constant upsurge and highway system carries
more vehicle miles of travel than ever before. The load on the transportation
system is mounting more rapidly than the improvements can be made. To offset
this, transportation system planners, engineers, and analysts are paying more
attention on the improvement of operational efficiency of roadway networks. This
requires identification of trouble spots and bottlenecks in a system where
capacity improvements are needed, and to develop plans that meet the needs of
the system, which are often restrained by social, environmental, and economic
concerns. Pakistan being a developing country does not have enough resources to
carryout the changes occurring in the traffic system and its volume. From the
several options available to resolve the problem of traffic the best suited for this
kind of environment is the low cost traffic management. Traffic planners at
national level have a big challenge not only to streamline the problem but also to
economize it. Several techniques and options are adopted over the world to
address this kind of issues. Modeling traffic operations using computers have unmatched benefits and
allows the traffic engineers in providing acceptable alternatives to address a
given problem with reasonably low cost and efforts. For this reason traffic
simulation models are becoming popular in the planning and operational analysis
of transportation facilities. The development of computers with high speed
processors has made it possible to simulate the traffic conditions on the roads
down to the level of individual vehicle. This has enabled microscopic simulation
modeling a viable and the most powerful tool to find out solution to the problems
arising from a wide variety of complex and conflicting situations
