Traffic flow velocity disturbance characteristics and control strategy at the bottleneck of expressway

In the three-phase traffic flow studies, the traffic flow characteristic at the bottleneck section is a hot spot in the academic field. The controversy about the characteristics of the synchronized flow at bottleneck is also the main contradiction between the three-phase traffic flow theory and the traditional traffic flow theory. Under the framework of three-phase traffic flow theory, this paper takes the on-ramp as an example to discuss the traffic flow characteristics at the bottleneck section.In particular, this paper mainly conducts the micro-analysis to the effect of lane change under the two lane conditions, as well as the effect of the on-ramp on the main line traffic flow. It is found that when the main road flow is low, the greater the on-ramp inflow rate, the higher the average speed of the whole road section. As the probability of vehicles entering from the on-ramp increases, the flow and the average speed of the main road are gradually stabilized, and then the on-ramp inflow vehicles no longer have a significant impact on the traffic flow. In addition, this paper focuses on the velocity disturbance generated at the on-ramp, and proposes the corresponding on-ramp control strategy based on it, and the simulation verified that the control strategy can reasonably control the traffic flow by the on-ramp, which can meet the control strategy requirements to some extent.

Epidemic-Like Proximity-Based Traffic Offloading

Cellular networks are overloaded due to the mobile traffic surge,and mobile social networks(MSNets) can be leveraged for traffic offloading.In this paper,we study the issue of choosing seed users for maximizing the mobile traffic offloaded from cellular networks.We introduce a gossip-style social cascade(GSC) model to model the epidemic-like information diffusion process in MSNets.For static-case and mobile-case networks,we establish an equivalent view and a temporal mapping of the information diffusion process,respectively.We further prove the submodularity in the information diffusion and propose a greedy algorithm to choose the seed users for traffic offloading,yielding a sub-optimal solution to the NP-hard traffic offloading maximization(TOM) problem.Experiments are carried out to study the offloading performance,illustrating that the greedy algorithm significantly outperforms the heuristic and random algorithms,and user mobility can help further reduce cellular load.

An environment-friendly control method for congestion flow ahead of expressway toll stations

To alleviate the resulting increase in energy consumption and emissions and other issues caused by the traffic congestion ahead of the expressway toll station, a novel traffic flowcontrol method is put forward based on the environment-friendly conception. The technical thinking of inducing the slowly moving traffic into a batch pass is determined based on the conclusion of the research, traffic flowtheory and traffic sensing detection technology. The model of stop times is established and the parameters of the system are optimized in accordance with the principle of minimizing the fuel consumption. The optimal location selection of traffic control lights and Detector 2 for queue of different lengths at toll stations are calculated based on the model. Finally, the effect of the congestion flowcontrol system is verified via the Paramics simulation system. The result shows that the control system is capable of reducing90% of fuel consumption for vehicles going through toll stations.

On the modeling of synchronized flow in cellular automaton models

In this paper, we further analyze our cellular automaton （CA） traffic flow model. By changing some parameters, the characteristics of our model can be significantly varied, ranging from the features of phase transitions to the number of traffic phases. We also review the other CA models based on Kerner＇s three-phase traffic theory. By comparisons, we find that the core concepts for modeling the synchronized flow in these models are similar. Our model can be a good candidate for modeling the synchronized flow, since there is enough flexibility in our framework.

Capacity models on expressway near a bus bay stop with an access

To determinate the expressway capacity near a bus bay stop with an access, capacity models on the expressway near a bus stop with an access were developed on the basis of gap acceptance theory and queuing theory. Depending on a bus stop position to an entrance or an exit ramp, the capacity models were developed for four cases. Bus bay stops with overflow and bus bay stops without overflow were considered. A comparison of simulation experiment and model calculation was carried out. Results show that the suggested models have high accuracy and reliability, at bus arrival rate below 60 vehicles per hour(veh/h) or vehicle volumes at the entrance and the exit below 200 passenger cars units per hour(pcu/h), and there are no significant difference in the capacities for four cases. When bus arrival rate is above 240 veh/h, the capacities of all four cases will decline rapidly. With berth number increasing, the increasing of the capacities is no obvious for four cases. As the bus arrival rate and vehicle volumes at the entrance and the exit increase, bus stops located downstream of an entrance and upstream of an exit have a remarkably effect on the capacities. The latter case is much heavier than the former. Those results can be used to traffic design and optimization on urban expressway near a bus stop with an access.

Detailed string stability analysis for bi-directional optimal velocity model

The class of bi-directional optimal velocity models can describe the bi-directional looking effect that usually exists in the reality and is even enhanced with the development of the connected vehicle technologies. Its combined string stability condition can be obtained through the method of the ring-road based string stability analysis. However, the partial string stability about traffic fluctuation propagated backward or forward was neglected, which will be analyzed in detail in this work by the method of transfer function and its H∞ norm from the viewpoint of control theory. Then, through comparing the conditions of combined and partial string stabilities, their relationships can make traffic flow be divided into three distinguishable regions, displaying various combined and partial string stability performance. Finally, the numerical experiments verify the theoretical results and find that the final displaying string stability or instability performance results from the accumulated and offset effects of traffic fluctuations propagated from different directions.

Traffic services for vehicles: the process from receiving raw probe data to space-time diagrams and the resulting traffic service

Today, large quantities of vehicle data(FCD:floating car data) are widely used by traffic service providers to create and broadcast traffic states in road networks. As a first processing step, all raw position data received from Global Positioning Systems(GPS) have to be map matched in a digital road map. The technical aspects of such a matching process for GPS data are described in this report. After the matching process, spacetime-diagrams are created of the probe data showing traffic situation details over space and time. Various examples illustrate how traffic service quality depends on the number of matched GPS raw data; it will be stated that when 2% of connected vehicles in the total traffic flow are sending their GPS data in shorter time intervals, a high quality and precise reconstruction of the current traffic phases is achieved. Traffic reconstruction is followed by a translation into traffic information messages, which can be sent and used in vehicle navigation systems for driver information and dynamic route guidance.

Planning VANET infrastructures to improve safety awareness in curved roads

We analyze the effect of using a vehicular ad-hoc network(VANET) on accident avoidance.As shown in our analysis,a higher frequency of safety packets can prevent accidents,even for high speed vehicles and dense roads.To overcome connectivity problems in blind crossing situations,a genetic algorithm(GA) based method is presented for VANET infrastructure planning.The proposed approach tries to remove coverage sight holes in low sight distance cases in a traveling path in the road.In such places,drivers might not have enough sight for proper action and also environmental obstacles prevent direct communication between vehicles.Furthermore,curved roads affect mobility.Simulation results show that the density of vehicles is increased right before a curve and is decreased after that.Therefore,in this kind of road,a high frequency of packet generation may not act well in accident avoidance.The method proposed in this paper tries to cover such places considering the lowest safety distances according to traffic theory.For this,the road must be covered directly by infrastructure.Therefore,the problem is to find the best number and also positions of road side units.Using GA,the algorithm minimizes the summation of total uncovered and overlapped points in the roads which are covered by more than one antenna.Simulation on a real road map confirmed the capabilities of the proposed approach.