Comparative analysis of stage and phase signal control of a signalised intersection

Traffic signal control can either be based stage or phase based and as such phase is when a set of movements takes place simultaneously and stage is that of cycle in which a particular set of phases receives green. A four arm signalized intersections was studied to make comparison of this two types of signal control, the saturation flow rate, cycle time, turning movement, signal timing, delay and level of service for each approach and the intersections for peak periods for both morning and evening periods was determined. British design, Highway capacity Manual and Transyt 13 were used to analyze for both stage and phase control. At the end of the study it was observed that the cycle time for stage control was high delay was very high, and as such level of service for the intersection was F for both morning and evening data. When phase control was used the cycle time reduced, the delay reduced, the level of service improved from F to C for all the three methodology used