Optimal Control of Internal Road Boundary for Lane-free Automated Vehicle Traffic

This paper presents a novel traffic control action referring to virtual moving of the internal boundary of bi-directional highways for lane-free traffic of automated vehicles. Since capacity of lane-free traffic is roughly proportional to the road width, the total cross-road capacity may be shared flexibly (in space and time) between the two opposite directions according to the current bi-directional demand. In order to determine the control input, which is the road width or capacity sharing factor, an appropriate QP (Quadratic Programming) problem formulation employing the macroscopic CTM (Cell Transmission Model) is developed. Simulation results with and without control are analyzed and compared to demonstrate the potential of the proposed scheme in exploiting the available road infrastructure at unprecedented levels.