UBTSC Pty Ltd

Liquid Flow Traffic Management Systems

TMS—General Information

Roads & Interchanges

 

Because this is an Australian invention, all references are made for traveling on the left side of the road. These designs can, of course, be altered to suit driving on the right side of the road in countries other than Australia.

By integrating the arterial road network and freeway network so both work in unison Liquid Flow Traffic is achieved.

It’s our business to get you there by road without interrupting your journey by stopping at a single intersection.

It’s our business to reduce your travel time and save you money.

It’s our business to eliminate traffic jams and gridlock.

To do this successfully we have designed road intersections that allow you the motorist to enter and more importantly exit any intersection at any time of day, without stopping, especially during peak period rush hour traffic.

Today as you leave home for the working day do you find yourself on a major arterial road constantly stopping, starting, and waiting, for a traffic light or at a roundabout?

When you use a freeway do you find that traffic is not flowing at the posted speed?

Our business objective is to change that by installing Liquid Flow Intersections.

They are the Turnabout and the High Speed Interchange 

Both are designed to fit within existing intersection road dimensions on arterial roads and freeways.

Despite extensive arterial roads around a town or city, traffic congestion still occurs. As this congestion is increased vehicles have to stop and slow down when they are on a major road that is intersected by access roads that are classed as the minor road. The major problem has always been the right turning traffic crossing in front of through traffic to enter the minor road.

We know that by making 2 minor adjustments to the way you enter and exit intersections you the travelling public will benefit with Liquid Flow Traffic

Our Turnabouts eliminate the need to stop when entering or exiting the intersection

Our Turnabouts can be installed underground or overhead. We call them Terrasphere Turnabouts for the above ground and Terradome Turnabouts for the underground version.

In any cross road situation where traffic flows are such that a roundabout and traffic lights cannot cope this is the ideal situation for a two level Turnabout to be installed. This allows the major road unimpeded through flow and at the same time left turning and right turning traffic although it may have to slow will not hold up or stop the through traffic.

The ideal situation is to place the Turnabouts off suburbs that have a limited number of access points to an arterial road. They can however be placed anywhere in the mosaic of roads around any town or city. The more that are in place the more Liquid Flow is achieved.

The Turnabout is named such as we believe that as you approach and join the Turnabout you do so by taking turns.

As your speed has slowed to allow you to enter the Turnabout it gives you the driver time to adjust your actions. If you see that the vehicle on the Turnabout is in front of you as you are about to merge, you slow a little if necessary and tack on behind them. If you are in front of them they tack on behind you. In heavy traffic flows you take turns alternately. We only do this in a one lane situation so you only have to gauge the merge distances of one car at a time. 

There is no right of way except that the vehicle that is furthest in front in the merge on the Turnabout goes first.

We call this common courtesy.

All left turning traffic on the major road turns left from the left lane.

All right turning traffic on the major road turns right from the right lane enters the ramp up or down to join the Turnabout goes around and when exiting the Turnabout to reach your destination you enter the road you are turning into in your own right hand lane.

“T” intersection Turnabouts are treated in a similar manner.

This means that when you turn left you stay in the left hand lane and when you turn right you stay in the right hand lane. Then you continue as normal.

Once in the suburb high speeds are not wanted or required.

So let’s take this to the next stage. The major road has continuous flow as does left and right turn traffic, even though this may require a reduction in speed, but all traffic is flowing.

The Turnabout also allows the minor road traffic to cross from one suburb to the other as well as right turning to the major road to join and merge into that road in the right hand lane.

If the through traffic crossing from suburb to suburb increases to the point where it slows right turning traffic that has to queue and that in turn affects the major road flow we enter the second stage of the intersection upgrade.

To remedy this we merely add another level for just that through traffic.

The efficiency of this system is that it can be upgraded later as flows increase making the Turnabout section exclusively for right turning traffic only.

Because today’s roads are designed to a standard width this makes the construction of Turnabouts standard as well therefore saving costs.

For a Terrasphere we have the entire structure built off site and erected in situ as soon as the foundations are in place. Made in a prefabricated way installation requires a crane and finishing off details only. Using standard design intersections these can be installed and be operating in days without interrupting the existing flow on that intersection.

We can excavate and construct the Terradome Turnabout on site without impeding the existing traffic by installing a standard temporary structure over the intersection to allow the existing flow to continue without change while construction takes place.

This structure is then removed to the next site for upgrade. This would require two days, one to install the structure and the other to remove it and place it into the next intersection that is to be upgraded to a Liquid Flow Intersection. Construction work in both cases will not affect the existing traffic flow.

Ramp approach and departure angles may be non standard depending on the local topography but at all times line of sight when merging on the Turnabouts is maintained. This means they may be short and steep or long and less steep but when you get to the Turnabout merge you can see the other cars and they can see you.

All merges onto the road being entered or exited must and will have sufficient length to allow rear and side mirror vision for safe merging. When travelling slowly they need not be as long as when merging into fast lanes where they need to be longer.

Every Turnabout includes pedestrian/bicycle crossings in the design and construction as they also have to be separated from the road traffic. Bicycle lanes can be accommodated within the Turnabouts as simply as Pedestrian’s crossing and these in turn are separated on the Turnabout.

Businesses that have immediate access to an arterial road will find that their vehicles will be able to enter and exit with a left turn only. However if the road width can maintain a feeder road from and too the Turnabouts this would be the preferred option.

Of course where a major road has Turnabouts placed along its length the traffic can utilise the Turnabout as a safe place to do a U turn to gain access to buildings on the other side of the road. This again maintains traffic flow as no vehicles are held up behind a single vehicle attempting to right turn into a minor road or building on the right.

To maintain Liquid Flow the existing major road has to have free uninterrupted traffic flow with the minimum of slowing.

One way street systems can work far more efficiently with these concepts and the physical pinch points can be removed or bypassed with good engineering.

In its most basic form any single lane road can carry unlimited traffic if that traffic can exit that road at the same rate or faster. The faster you go the more vehicles pass a given point.

To this end as main arterial roads increase in traffic flow and volume the speed can be electronically adjusted to cope with the extra flow rates as and when required. Eventually as roads are improved and Liquid Flow is achieved speed limits will be raised to allow more vehicles to use the existing roads safely.

 

Major arterial cross roads and freeway interchanges

How many times when exiting from a freeway have you been faced with a traffic light and you had to stop at the end of the off ramp to turn left or right?

We eliminate this stop completely.

Where two major roads or freeways cross then the High Speed Intersections are constructed also within the dimensions and confines of the existing roadway.

These are the penultimate in their ability to allow all vehicles turning left, right or travelling straight through to do so without any appreciable lessening of speed.

As we can construct them so compact they will ‘fit’ into any major arterial road intersection.

These also can be upgraded to multiple lane left and right turn traffic lanes as vehicle volume flows increase.

We also design intersections following the same formula where there are 5, 6, 7, 8, or more roads intersecting and we still maintain Liquid Flow.

One problem associated with freeways is overcoming traffic stopping on freeways when there has been an accident that stops all traffic.

If there is an incident such as a collision on a freeway that stops traffic in one direction we have a method of removing the vehicles stopped on that section to allow them to retrace their route till they reach the detour around and past the incident.

If Liquid Flow intersections are in place on all intersections then this detour allows for an adjustment of the speed on the roads to compensate for the extra traffic.

In effect both directions of traffic can be detoured around the incident and the Emergency Services have a clear run on and to the incident site.

No more sitting in stopped traffic for hours.

This is accomplished by using crossover sections incorporated into the freeway under the overall supervision of police emergency services. All other traffic attempting to access that section is rerouted around the blocked section until it is cleared of obstacles.

With these concepts it is possible to maintain traffic flow without stopping, much like the flow of a river.

Where a river has flow if you place an obstruction into it the river water will build up upstream and reduce downstream but the water passing the obstruction travels faster. Within the affected section you have changed the flow dynamics of the river but the overall flow has not stopped. That is Liquid Flow.

We do the same thing with our road intersection designs to maintain Liquid Flow at all times and we unlike a river can go faster or slower as need requires.

 

Some of the advantages to you the motorist

When you drive through our intersections you will not have to stop as traffic flows smoothly and uninterrupted.

You will save money as there will be significant savings in your travel times, your fuel consumption and your vehicle maintenance costs. We calculate that you will save up to 40% of your fuel bill. You will be able to plan your journey times because you know that the road traffic travels at the designated speed.

As well as reducing your fuel bill you will be helping the environment because your vehicle will operate at maximum efficiency, because you never stop, so you will reduce fuel pollution emissions by as much as 40%.

There will be less danger of collisions at intersections so driver and passenger injuries and deaths will be significantly reduced.

Safe pedestrian and cyclist crossings integrated in the designs will reduce pedestrian and cyclist injuries and deaths when crossing the road.

The High Speed Freeway Intersection and the Turnabout© intersections use less space than current intersections allowing placement into a smaller area without loosing effectiveness. This saves you the taxpayer the extra costs of land requirements presently needed to construct present day obsolete and inefficient intersections based on old designs.

The Turnabout© design allows the centre to be utilised by Emergency Services that require urgent and immediate access to the major road networks i.e. Police, Fire, Ambulance, or they can be used for gardening or aquaculture.

All our Emergency Services will benefit when they are going to the scene of an accident or incident as they will have uninterrupted routes to travel without slowing or stopping. Time is precious when saving lives.

The Terradome Turnabout© design also incorporates the collection of storm water stored in a reservoir beneath the Turnabout©. This water can be used for any number of purposes .The roadway above the Turnabout© is covered in mesh to allow natural light and air into the subterranean area.

Because the costs of construction are significantly less than present multi level intersections or tunnels, only one lane is required per exit, this will save you the taxpayer. You get more Liquid Flow Intersections for your money.

Using Liquid Flow Intersections that allow the through traffic uninterrupted flow existing arterial roads may carry more vehicles more efficiently reducing the need for expensive new road construction.

At no time is their provision, or is there a need, for traffic lights at any intersection so we eliminate the frustrating stop start traffic flow presently experienced by you.

As we can all reach our destination without traffic jams and gridlock driver frustration and road rage will be reduced as all traffic flows freely without traffic jams. This means you get home in a reasonable time. We believe that you should travel at the maximum designated speed, without constantly stopping, on every road you use.

In the event of an accident on any road if the intersections around that accident scene have Liquid Flow you merely detour around the accident scene and as traffic speeds are increased on the detour roads you will still reach your destination on time without being stopped in traffic gridlock.

You the taxpayer will further benefit because there will be a saving to the economy of billions of dollars currently lost as a result of traffic jams and gridlock.

It’s our business to design and build intersections to eliminate traffic jams and gridlock.

It’s our business to give you the consumer Liquid Flow Traffic solutions.

It’s our business to get you to and from home faster and safer every day.

It’s your business to tell us where you want Liquid Flow Intersections.

How?

Contact us or your Government Road, Traffic or Highway Authority in your area for more information.

 

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