Overview
The project MOBITRAFF developed innovative services in the fields of urban mobility and traffic management using an emerging wireless technology called “vehicular ad hoc networks” (VANETs). The project innovation consisted in the use of VANETs to correlate services from both fields (mobility management and traffic management) in a comprehensive, secure, decentralised, and self-organised way.
The main aim of the project in terms of mobility management was to improve the quality of public transport services by minimising traveling time, harmonising headways and providing passengers with dynamic public transport guidance. The objectives in terms of traffic management were to improve road efficiency by mitigating flash crowd effects (FCE) and minimising stop-and-go driving conditions.
Funding
Results
Mobility Management improvements were achieved by implementing dynamic differential traffic lights schedules giving priority to public transport plus a personalised navigation service for passengers. Advancements in terms of traffic management consisted in a green light speed advisory system calculating optimal speeds of vehicles according to real-time traffic and light scheduling information as well as to cooperative route selection by vehicles.
Innovation aspects
The key innovation of this project consisted in i) joint addressing, in a comprehensive and decentralised way, the mobility and traffic related services mentioned above using cost-effective vehicle-to-vehicle communications technology, ii) addressing the problem of cooperative routing mitigating the flash crowd effect in “system” and “user” optimum settings.