Motorist Understanding of Pavement Centre Lines and their Effect on Driving Behaviour

Abstract

Human factors and more generally driver errors account for the largest number of road accidents. Driver errors are external human factors that can contribute to specific error types selected from slip, lapse, mistake and violation. Action and information retrieval errors are both examples of driver errors. The failure to interpret correctly an intended road marking’s message causes driver misunderstanding and lead to a driver error. Centre lines are examples of such markings and if misread or unrecognised may cause unintentional driver violations and unsafe driving. This study focused on the examining of driver understanding of road markings, and the influence of centre lines on their driving behaviour. This study determined that drivers had a much better understanding of the overtaking messages intended by road markings, than the directional flow message. Drivers demonstrated that they relied more on signs and other drivers to determine whether the road is a two-way or not. This study demonstrated that the presence of both centre lines and edge lines have a positive effect on a driver in handling and controlling of their vehicles’ position. It was postulated from this study that the absence of the edge lines has a more significant effect on a vehicle’s position than the absence of centre lines.