Modified Traffic Flow Model with Connected Vehicle Microscopic Data for Proactive Variable Speed Limit Control

Abstract

Most previous prediction based Variable Speed Limit (VSL) control strategies focused on improving traffic mobility based on the macroscopic traffic data. Nowadays, the emerging technologies provide access to the microscopic traffic flow data, which better captures the details of traffic flow dynamics in the VSL controlled environment. Thus, in this paper, the microscopic traffic flow data were utilized as a supplement to predict the evolutions of traffic flow parameters. The proposed VSL control algorithm adopts the Model Predictive Control (MPC) framework, which employs a modified version of the classic traffic flow model METANET to take advantage of the microscopic data in traffic flow predictions. The microscopic traffic simulation software VISSIM was used to establish an experimental simulation platform and perform real time traffic responsive control based on field data. The proposed control strategy was evaluated against the no-VSL control and macroscopic-based VSL controlled scenario. The results show that utilizing the proposed modified METANET model reduced the error in speed prediction accuracy and improved system mobility performance.

Variable Speed Limit Strategies Based on the Macro Hierarchical Control Traffic Flow Model

“…Besides the direct application of VSL on traffic system, it is also introduced into micro-and mesotraffic flow model [17,18] and other optimization models [19][20][21][22]. Abdel et al used microscopic simulation models to analyze the effects of different speed limit strategies on alleviating and improving road safety [17].…”

“…e improved model reduces the speed prediction accuracy error and improves the performance of the system [19]. Alasiri used microscopic simulation software to combine the cell transmission model (CTM) and variable speed limit strategy to verify the effectiveness of the robust VSL controller [20].…”

Research on Joint Control of On-Ramp Metering and Mainline Speed Guidance in the Urban Expressway Based on MPC and Connected Vehicles

“…From the literature review, it was found that the operational efficiency or capacity was used as the main optimization objective while traffic safety was rarely considered. Besides, there was a new trend that the connected vehicles and/or V2X (vehicle to vehicle, vehicle to infrastructure, and others) were considered increasingly which greatly influenced the operation environment [17,18].…”

RETRACTED CHAPTER: Optimization of Driving Efficiency for Pre-determined Routes: Proactive Vehicle Traffic Control

“…IoV (Vehicle Internet), is the inevitable convergence between the mobile Internet for vehicles and IoT. When in a vehicular network human control is removed by autonomous vehicles; they cooperate efficiently thus controlling the flow of traffic on the roads [ 2 ]. Visionaries predict that autonomous vehicles behave much better than human drivers, which will allow controlling more traffic in less time, producing less pollution and generating greater comfort for passengers [ 3 ].…”