Urban network geofencing with dynamic speed limit policy via deep reinforcement learning

Wenqi Lu, Ziwei Yi, Gyözö Gidofalvi, Michele D. Simoni, Yikang Rui and Bin Ran

Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, 2024, vol. 183, issue C

Abstract: Urban environment and mobility are threatened by traffic congestion due to the growth in the number of vehicles and urbanization. To address this problem, we propose a deep reinforcement learning-based (DRL) urban network geofencing (UNG) strategy for traffic management to improve traffic operations and sustainability. The proposed solution creates a real-time geofence that consists of several sub-networks where dynamic speed limit policies are implemented. The road links in each sub-network share the same speed limit policy in a control cycle. An actor-critic framework is developed to learn the discrete speed limits of sub-networks in a continuous action space, and a reward function is developed based on the average speeds of vehicles on the network. A twin delayed deep deterministic policy gradient (TD3) method is introduced for calibrating the actor-critic networks and solving the overestimation bias problem arising with the function approximation. Based on the traffic simulation of a real-world local network in Shanghai, the performance of the geofencing methods is investigated in various scenarios characterized by different levels of traffic demand and control settings. The findings suggest that the proposed TD3-UNG controller is capable of generating beneficial dynamic speed limit policies to reduce total time spent, emissions, and fuel consumption in various scenarios.

Keywords: Efficient mobility; Urban network geofencing; Dynamic speed limit policy; Reinforcement learning technology; Traffic environment (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0965856424001150
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:transa:v:183:y:2024:i:c:s0965856424001150

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/supportfaq.cws_home/regional
https://shop.elsevie ... _01_ooc_1&version=01

DOI: 10.1016/j.tra.2024.104067

Access Statistics for this article

Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice is currently edited by John (J.M.) Rose

More articles in Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().