Macroscopic Effects of Multianticipative Driving Behavior on Traffic Flow Characteristics

Abstract

Intelligent transportation systems have been considered an important solution in enhancing freeway capacity and suppressing traffic congestion. One recent automotive technology has enabled a vehicle to communicate with several vehicles ahead via a wireless system. Such a communication system constitutes so-called multianticipative driving behavior. In general, the effect of multianticipative interactions on traffic flow dynamics has been studied widely in the literature on the basis of a microscopic modeling approach. This paper presents an alternative approach to gain insights into the effect of multianticipative driving behavior on traffic flow characteristics from a macroscopic model. The model is obtained from a gas-kinetic theory in which the multianticipative interactions are taken into consideration. It is found that the analytical and numerical results of the model are consistent with those obtained from microscopic models. It is argued that the results provide a better understanding of the effect of multianticipative interactions on traffic flow characteristics.

Multianticipative Nonlocal Macroscopic Traffic Model

“…According to condition (24), for any values of the space headway s = 1/r which produce positive values of function y(r ), traffic will become linearly unstable. This figure illustrates that multianticipative driving behavior leads to stabilization of traffic flow, which is consistent with findings in some recent microscopic models (Treiber et al, 2006;Hoogendoorn et al, 2007;Kesting and Treiber, 2008) and in existing multianticipative macroscopic models (Wilson et al, 2004;Ngoduy, 2009). It also indicates that the finite deceleration term contributes to the stabilization of traffic flow and has a larger impact on the stability with an increased number of anticipations than the OV-type model.…”

“…Note that the existing multianticipative models of Wilson et al. () or Ngoduy () neglect the contribution of the second element in their derivations.…”

“…It is also worth noticing that neither the model of Wilson et al. () nor the model of Ngoduy () consider the contribution of the finite deceleration time (i.e., ). We will show later that this contribution will improve the model performance over the existing multianticipative macroscopic models.…”

“…Although Wilson et al (2004) have recently discussed ways to consider multianticipative driving behavior in a macroscopic model, their methods are actually based on the extended OV-type models and they have claimed that the derived macroscopic model has increasingly failed with an increased number of anticipations. Subsequently, Ngoduy (2009) has also developed a multianticipative macroscopic model based on the OV-type model and studied the effects of multianticipations on traffic flow instabilities. Nevertheless, as the derivation is somehow similar to those mentioned in Wilson et al (2004) this model also suffers from the same drawbacks.…”

The Roles of Car Following and Lane Changing Drivers’ Anticipations during Vehicle Inserting Process: A Structural Equation Model Approach

“…This assumption has been verified by previous studies of CF behaviour. The longitudinal anticipation is modelled as a CF driver's estimation of one or more leaders' movements in one or more future moments [18][19][20]. Lateral anticipation is presented as that a staggered leader in the same lane or the neighbouring lane of the CFV brings the driver's lateral disturbance and triggers his or her deceleration [21,22].…”