Transportation Engineer Tackles Tucson’s Traffic Flow

Every day, an average of 41,000 vehicles travel along Speedway Boulevard, which runs from east to west through Tucson and the University of Arizona campus. The drivers of many of those vehicles have experienced the frustration of being stopped at a traffic light for longer than they’d like, a problem one University of Arizona researcher is trying to fix.

Civil and architectural engineering and mechanics professor Yao-Jan Wu, who specializes in data-driven solutions to traffic operations issues, is working with the City of Tucson to ease traffic congestion by optimizing the timing of traffic lights.

“It would be nice to help all drivers get green lights all the time, but of course, that’s impossible,” Wu said. “Our goal is not only to improve traffic efficiency, but also traffic safety.”

Wu and his Smart Transportation Laboratory team are heading into the third year of a partnership with the City of Tucson, which has provided $375,000 for the work so far. On a road as busy as Speedway, this research is critical: A 2017 study by Wu’s group showed that at the intersection of Speedway Boulevard and Campbell Avenue, each vehicle was delayed an average of 42.7 seconds during weekday peak hours. That’s about 264,343 hours of delay annually from one intersection alone.

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