Consensus-Based Cooperative Control Approach Applied to Urban Traffic Networks

Nowadays many studies are conducted to develop solutions for improving the performance of urban traffic networks. One of the main challenges is the necessary cooperation among different entities such as vehicles or infrastructure systems and exploit the information available through networks of sensors deployed as infrastructures for smart cities. In this work an algorithm for cooperative control of urban subsystems is applied in order to provide solutions for mobility related problems in cities. The interconnected traffic lights controllers (TLC) network adapts traffic lights cycles, based on traffic and air pollution information, in order to improve the performance of urban traffic networks. The presence of air pollution in cities is not only caused by road traffic but there are other pollution sources that contribute to increase or decrease of the pollution level. Then the problem becomes more complex. Due to the distributed and heterogeneous nature of the different components involved, a system of systems engineering approach has been followed as design method and a distributed consensus-based control algorithm has been applied. The applied control law contains a consensus-based component that uses the information shared in the network for reaching a consensus in the state of TLC network components. Furthermore, Discrete Event Systems Specification (DEVS) formalism is applied for modelling and simulation purpose. The proposed solution has been tested and validated in a simulated environment corroborating that the proposed solution is a powerful technique to deal with simultaneous responses to both pollution levels and traffic flows in urban traffic networks.