Adaptive Approaches for Tidal-Flow Lanes in Urban-Road Networks

Abstract

Every year, traffic congestion costs the global economy billions of dollars in lost productivity, particularly in urban areas. Traffic congestion is a complex problem, as traffic conditions may change at any time. Tidal-flow lanes can be utilised as a feasible traffic-congestion-mitigation strategy to balance the fluctuating traffic demands throughout the day. This paper proposes an adaptive-lane-reversal approach for tidal-flow lanes, to decrease the impact of traffic congestion in urban areas. In order to evaluate the adaptive approach under various traffic conditions, several algorithms and parameter sets are examined, using various network models and traffic demands. As a result, the total travel time of the vehicles in the various networks was decreased by up to 81%.