A platoon regulation algorithm to improve the traffic performance of highway work zones

This paper presents a cooperative traffic control strategy to increase the capacity of non-recurrent bottlenecks such as work zones by making full use of the spatial resources upstream of work zones. The upstream area is divided into two zones: the regulation area and the merging area. The basic logic is that a large gap is more efficient in accommodating merging vehicles than several small and scattered gaps with the same total length. In the regulation area, a non-linear programming model is developed to balance both traffic capacity improvements and safety risks. A two-step solving algorithm is proposed for finding optimal solutions. In the merging area, the sorting algorithm is used to design lane changing trajectories based on the regulated platoons. A case study is conducted, and the results indicate that the proposed model is able to significantly improve work zone capacity with minor disturbances to the traffic.