Abstract
The rat-run traffic in community roads is a big problem in terms of traffic safety. Physical devices for traffic calming, such as chokers and speed humps, have been used to deal with the problems. However, these measures can't exclude rat-runners from community roads, that is, these are not fundamental solutions for rat-running. The authors focused on the rising bollard, which has prevailed in European countries. The rising bollard prevents cars from going through a closed road against the traffic regulation but allows specific vehicles with authority to pass through the road by making its steel bollard go down automatically. The system had not been introduced on public roads in Japan.
In a previous study, the authors proposed the soft rising bollard, which equips a flexible soft bollard so that cars and the bollard are not damaged when the cars crash the bollard accidentally. In this study, the soft rising bollard were installed tentatively in a shopping mall where the road was closed to cars in a part of a day; it was the first time that the rising bollard worked on a public road in Japan. The authors assessed the safety in use on the public road, the efficiency in encouraging car drivers to follow to the traffic regulation, and acceptance of the system by the general public. From camera surveillances, it was found that the numbers of cars that pass the road against the traffic regulation reduced after the installation of the soft rising bollard. Questionnaire surveys to citizens displayed a high rate of positive opinions about the soft rising bollard. In conclusion, this study revealed the soft rising bollard is an effective measure to deal with rat-running problems in Japan.
