01698298

Component

The traffic control of an arbitrary network of signalized intersections is considered. This work presents a new version of the max-pressure controller, also known as back-pressure. The most remarkable features of the max-pressure algorithm for traffic signal control are scalability, stability, and distribution. The modified version presented in this paper improves the practical applicability of the max-pressure controller by considering as input travel times instead of queue lengths. The two main practical advantages of this new version are: (i) travel times are easier to estimate than queue lengths, and (ii) max-pressure controller based on travel times has an inherent capacity-aware property, i.e., it takes into account the finite capacity of each link. Travel time tends to diverge when the queue length is close to its capacity. It should be noted that previous max-pressure algorithms rely exclusively on queue length measurements, which may be difficult to accomplish in practice. Moreover, these previous algorithms generally assume queues with unbounded capacity. This is problematic because a point queue model is not able to reproduce spillbacks, which are a crucial issue that a traffic signal controller should avoid. After presenting the modified version of the max-pressure controller, it is compared with existing control policies in a microscopic traffic simulator. Moreover, results of a real implementation of the developed algorithm to a signalized intersection, located at an urban arterial in Jerusalem, are shown. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first real implementation of a max-pressure controller at a signalized intersection.

This paper was sponsored by TRB committee AHB25 Standing Committee on Traffic Signal Systems.

19-02944

English

23p

2019

Transportation Research Board 98th Annual Meeting

Digital/other

Figures; References; Tables

Back pressure; Highway traffic control; Microscopic traffic flow; Signalized intersections; Traffic queuing; Traffic signal controllers; Travel time; Urban areas

Spillbacks

Jerusalem

Highways; Operations and Traffic Management; Planning and Forecasting

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2019 Paper #19-02944

TRIS, TRB, ATRI

Dec 7 2018 9:51AM