Incident parameter scheduled freeway traffic control - A ramp meter approach

Paper in proceeding, 2014

A novel model based local ramp metering method is presented in the paper by means of incident scheduled freeway traffic control solution. First, second order macroscopic freeway model is used with appropriate incident parametrization to describe eventual and unattended traffic variation caused by off-nominal traffic conditions (e.g. accidents). These traffic anomalies are captured by adequate model parameters, i.e. incident parameters that can be on-line estimated. The paper is motivated by incident scheduled ramp-meter solution to encounter real-time incident parameter information. The main idea is to use local freeway control solution triggered by available incident parameter values. The proposed approach is local in the sense of considering only non-coordinated ramp meter solution, first. Furthermore, we apply locally optimal (linearized) control solution to satisfy throughput maximization objective. The formal controller synthesis involves parameters to correct, compensate the effect of incidents. The proposed method is evaluated and compared to other existing approach by using simulation environment.