Driver Reaction Time

The ability to predict the response of a vehicle in a stream of traffic to the behavior of its predecessor is important in estimating what effect changes to the driving environment will have on traffic flow. Various proposed to explain this behavior have different strengths and weaknesses. The paper constructs a new model for the response of the following vehicle based on the assumption that each driver sets limits to his desired braking and acceleration rates. The parameters in the model correspond directly to obvious characteristics of driver behavior and the paper goes on to show that when realistic values are assigned to the parameters in a simulation.