Real-time Traffic Management through Knowledge- Based Models: the Trys Approach

This paper presents a general approach for real time traffic management using knowledge-based models named TRYS. Recognising that human intervention is still required to apply the current automatic traffic control systems, it is argued that there is a need for an additional intelligent layer to help operators to understand traffic problems and to make the best choice of strategic control actions. The need for an open architecture is stated, in order to allow users to modify decision criteria according to their experience. The result of applying this approach is the TRYS model, a knowledge-based traffic management model, which is in detailed described in this paper, that demonstrates the feasibility of the approach and the compatibility of this type of systems with state-of-the-art traffic control systems. The TRYS model was applied to develop several urban motorway control systems installed in the traffic control centres of different Spanish cities. At the end of the paper, the result of applying the TRYS approach to develop a traffic control management system for Barcelona is presented.