Areawide Multilevel Traffic Control Systems

Abstract The wide variety of computer and communications technology and hardware that is now available for use in traffic signal system control has greatly expanded the horizons of the traffic control engineer. It is now feasible, from both an economical and technical viewpoint, to introduce a much broader concept of traffic control than has previously been possible. This paper presents some thoughts on a unified concept of traffic control which would be applicable to various size cities. The paper discusses a multilevel approach to areawide traffic control. A four level control unit hierarchy is proposed to provide surveillance and control to all signals in an urban area. Attention is given to hardware requirements, control strategies, and system implementation. A brief discussion of the range of traffic control problems encountered in cities whose population may range from 50,000 to 1,000,000 is presented and the need for a unified concept of traffic control is defined.