ASSESSING THE EFFECT OF ROAD SPACE REALLOCATION CONSIDERING THE ENVIRONMENT OF BICYCLE FACILITIES

Abstract

Bicycles are widely used in Japan by people of all age groups in daily usage. Responding to the COVID-19 pandemic, bicycle will play a central role in commuting and traveling instead of using trains and other public transportation. However, the safety of bicycle facilities in Japan are still far behind comparing to the countries developed in Europe and America. The reason for this is that, a car traffic priority is still common in Japanese road planning. In this study, in order to examine the possibility of road space reallocation in Japan, we analyze the effect of three to two-lane road space reallocation considering the environment of bicycle facilities. The result shows the reallocation of road space has little negative influence on the traffic flow by estimating travel time, travel speed, conflict frequency and carbon dioxide emission.