Adaptive traffic signal control to reduce delay time at a single intersection point

Abstract

The increase in the number of vehicles in the traffic leads to traffic congestion and high delay times at key intersection points. To reduce the traffic density at intersections, researchers focus on the adaptive management of traffic lights according to the instantaneous state of the traffic. In this study, we propose two simple and easy to implement adaptive traffic signal management protocols for a single intersection point. These protocols use the vehicle to infrastructure communication technologies to gather information from the vehicles at an intersection, and dynamically adjust the traffic signal light duration or sequence or both. The aim of the study is to reduce the average waiting time at the intersection. The proposed protocols are tested through simulation. Results show that frequently checking the intersection state and determining the signal sequence adaptively lead to significant improvement in average delay time. Our best policy reduces the waiting time on average 80% for all vehicles, 81% for the left turn queue, and 68% for the straight pass and right turn queues. © 2021 IEEE.