Analysis of Toll Plaza using Queueing Theory

When a toll plaza is designed, choosing the right equipment and technology is a critical issue. In this paper , we try to compare manual collection and ETC(electronic toll collection) by creating a model for traffic in a toll plaza. We apply Queuing Theory to each stage, modelling each stage as a queuing system. We use probability distribution to calculate the average waiting time in terms of number of incoming lanes, traffic flow, and number of tollbooths. The average waiting time is the portion of the travel time that is dependent on the parameters of the system. Using this formula we compute the average waiting time for a broad range of lane counts, traffic levels, and tollbooth numbers, from which queue length and waiting time for each configuration were found and are displayed in tabular form. We recommend RF ID (Radio Frequency Identification) . We considered two scenarios of manual toll collection at Nanakaramguda Toll Plaza for 3 days during peak hours and RF ID performance at Choutuppal Toll plaza for one day. We concluded that service rate performance for RF ID is more efficient than manual service rate.