https://doi.org/10.1177/0361198118783171
Transportation Research Record
1–10
© National Academy of Sciences:
Transportation Research Board 2018
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DOI: 10.1177/0361198118783171
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JOURNAL OF THE TRANSPORTATION RESEARCH BOARD
Article
In urban areas, traffic calming measures have become a
necessity as different types of road users and vehicles inter-
act with each other continuously. Traffic calming measures
play an important role in traffic safety. Various kinds of traf-
fic calming measures used are speed bumps, speed humps,
speed cushions, speed tables, and chicanes. Among all, speed
humps (and variations such as speed bump, speed table) are
the most commonly used. It is mainly used to achieve lower
speeds in speed sensitive areas such as schools, parking lots,
toll plazas etc. Speed humps have the advantage of being
largely self-enforcing and of creating a visual impression,
real or imaginary, that speeding is not permitted on a given
stretch of the road (1). They are cost-efficient and restrict the
number of over-speeding drivers. Assembling and disman-
tling speed humps is very quick and they are easy to main-
tain. On the other hand, speed humps pose various limitations
such as the inconvenience caused to emergency vehicles and
discomfort to local residents who frequently use the road.
One major problem created by speed bumps is that non-
motorized vehicles such as bicyclists suffer severe vibrations
while crossing even at slow speeds. To overcome this short-
coming, various designs of speed humps with bicycle pass
lanes, speed tables with smooth channels, and speed kidney
have been introduced (2, 3). The efficacy of these designs is
yet to be validated in traffic conditions of developing nations,
which have a huge proportion of two-wheelers and do not
have proper road discipline. Thus, this study aims to modify
a speed bump to make it bicycle friendly and validate its
effects through before–after traffic analyses.
Literature Review
Traffic calming is the combination of mainly physical mea-
sures that reduce the negative effects of motor vehicle use,
alter driver behavior and improve conditions for non-motor-
ized street users (4). Various measures under traffic calming
are meant for controlling speed as well as managing traffic
flows. In urban areas, the driving speed plays a decisive role
in the severity of the crashes. The chances of fatal injury to
pedestrians increase from 10% to 75% if the speed of the
vehicle causing the crash is increased from 30 to 50 km/h (5).
Therefore, the use of traffic calming (speed controlling)
measures is unavoidable in urban and residential areas.
Variety of measures used include speed humps, raised cross-
walks, raised intersections, center islands and chicanes, to
name a few (6). Amongst these, speed humps/bumps are the
most popular owing to their simplicity as well
783171TRR XX X 10.1177/0361198118783171Transportation Research RecordVasudevan et al
research-article 2018
1
Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, Kanpur, India
Corresponding Author:
Address correspondence to Vinod Vasudevan: vinodv@iitk.ac.in
Design and Evaluation of K-Pass:
A Bicycle-Friendly Modification
of Speed Bumps
Vinod Vasudevan
1
, Aniruddha Rajurkar
1
,
Rahul Soni
1
, and Akhil Tiwari
1
Abstract
Traffic safety is a major concern across the world. Since speed is a major cause of traffic crashes, various traffic calming
measures are used to enhance the safety of the road users in urban areas. Speed humps and bumps are the most widely
used traffic calming devices. As a considerable number of bicyclists use the road along with motorized users, it is important
to consider them while deploying any traffic calming devices. Studies have shown that bicyclists experience significantly
larger discomfort as compared to motorized vehicles while passing over speed humps. In this study, a modification has
been proposed to enhance riding comfort of bicyclists without compromising the traffic calming attribute of a speed bump.
This modification is named “K-pass.” Analysis of data collected before and after the modification justifies the effectiveness
in reducing the discomfort of bicyclists. Over a period of eight months, 70% of the bicyclists chose to use K-pass. Data also
revealed that a high proportion of motorized two-wheeler users also used the K-pass at reduced speeds. It is expected
that the K-pass will be a useful modification to the existing speed humps and speed bumps in areas where bicycle usage is
expected.