Overview
Urban and suburban transport in Romania has been accomplished in accordance with sustainable transport requirements. It was necessary to undertake a systematic analysis of the functioning and structure of the transport system in order to be able to save resources and reduce its external effects (air, water, soil pollution).
It is obvious that external traffic effects and congestion cannot be reduced only through convergent solutions and the solutions can be identified and applied only with high expertise. Transport and traffic engineers as well as town planners, architects and sociologists can work together to seek sustainable development solutions.
The CONLIMIT project aimed to develop solutions limiting traffic congestion and its external effects in large urban areas. Its main objectives were:
- to survey the traffic in congested areas;
- to carry out a comparative study about the congested traffic in large Romanian urban areas;
- to evaluate the extra-capacity needs of the streets in Romanian large urban areas;
- to evaluate the travel delays (due to traffic congestion);
- to study the traffic environment that causes the congestion;
- to develop the adequate solutions for the Romanian traffic environment;
- to limit traffic congestion.
Traffic parameters and pollution levels have been evaluated in central areas from Bucharest, Timisoara and Craiova. The convergent strategy has been elaborated taking into consideration better use of the capacity of the existing street network through:
- new traffic assignment in congested areas;
- new design of intersections;
- access regulation at intersections;
- congestion charging in the city centre;
- vehicle and infrastructure investments (multi-level parking, exclusive pedestrian lanes, exclusive mass-transit infrastructure).