2010 International Conference on Intelligent Computation Technology and Automation

Cloud Theory Based Traffic State Identification for Urban Road Network

Wang Bo1, Xu Liangjie2, Zhang Wenbin1

1 2
Master Student Professor
School of Transportation School of Transportation
Wuhan University of Technology, 430063 Wuhan University of Technology, 430063
Wuhan city, Hubei, China Wuhan city, Hubei, China
E-mail: bob726@126.com E-mail: laurie119@sina.com

Abstract—In order to represent the fuzzy attribute of traffic

state, this paper first analyzed the characteristics and spread
mechanism of traffic congestion on urban road network.
Then a traffic state coefficient was introduced to measure the
congestion level on road sections. On the basis of cloud
theory, a fuzzy method of traffic state identification was
proposed. By constructing judgment matrix, an analytic
hierarchy model was established for road network. Finally,
the model was applied in the case of traffic state
identification for road network around Wuchang Railway
Station. Researches indicated that the identification result
conformed to actual situation.
II. TRAFFIC STATE IDENTIFICATION FOR ROAD
SECTIONS
According to the fuzzy attribute of traffic state, a cloud
theory based method of traffic state identification is
proposed to achieve an uncertainty conversion between
qualitative concept and quantitative value. The basic
philosophy of traffic state identification for road sections is
proposed, as shown in Figure 1.
Traffic investigation of road
sections

Keywords-Urban Road Network; Traffic State; Cloud Determination of traffic state

coefficient
Theory; Judgment Matrix; Analytic Hierarchy Model

Cloud transform of traffic

I. INTRODUCTION
In recent years, with the expansion of city size and the
increase in social activities, traffic demand grows rapidly
[1]. Meanwhile, traffic jams and accidents occur
frequently, which plagues cities seriously. As urban
transportation network is a dynamic and complex system
with uncertainty, traffic congestion is featured by
hierarchy, fuzziness, randomness and diversity.
The spread mechanism of traffic congestion on urban
road network is as follows. With the augment of traffic
volume, queues appear at bottleneck in road sections. Then
congestion spreads upstream gradually and results in
queues at surrounding bottlenecks. As the traffic demand
rises, congestion spreads in all directions, eventually
leading to a saturated cycle or even "deadlock" on local
road network [2].
Through state identification of traffic flow, the
bottleneck on road network is found out, and necessary
measures can be taken to relieve traffic congestion. Studies
on traffic state identification mainly focus on two kinds of
method. One method is based on HCM (Highway Capacity
Manual) of USA, in which traffic state is measured by
service level of highway. For the other one, traffic state is
classified by observation of traffic flow characteristics [3]-
[5]. However, the similarity of observation results is
analyzed qualitatively in these models, which makes the
identification criterion more ambiguous and restricts its
applicability [6].
In this case, an improvement of traffic state
identification for urban road network is made to face the
challenge.
state
Calculation of digital
characteristics in cloud model
Calculation of membership
degree
Selection of membership
cloud
Identification of congestion
level
Figure 1. Cloud theory based traffic state identification
By investigation of travel time, grading standards and
geometry measurement of road sections, the traffic state
coefficient is calculated firstly. Through cloud transform,
the digital characteristics of traffic state cloud is derived.
Then the membership degree of state coefficients to
possible cloud fields is calculated. According to
membership cloud with the maximum membership degree,
congestion level for certain traffic state coefficient is
identified correspondingly.
A. Characteristic Variables of Traffic Congestion
According to "Urban Traffic Management and
Evaluation System" (2002), the severity of traffic
congestion is measured by average travel speed of vehicles
on urban arterials [7]. The classification criterion is shown
in Table 1.

978-0-7695-4077-1/10 $26.00 © 2010 IEEE 946

DOI 10.1109/ICICTA.2010.179
 Table 1. Classification criterion of traffic congestion Where, C (t ) is the traffic state matrix for road sections
Level of Congestion Average Travel Speed（km/h） with a dimension of n , which is defined as follows:
Free ≥ 30
Slightly congested 20～30 ⎧1[ ( Sij (t ) < λ )and (aij = 1)and (i ≠ j; i, j ∈ I ) ]
cij (t ) = ⎨
Congested 10～20 ⎩ 0(other )
(4)
Severely congested <10
A traffic state coefficient, which is correlated Where, λ denotes the critical level of congestion.
negatively with average travel speed and positively with When Sij (t ) < λ , traffic flow on road sections is in free
saturation, is introduced to reflect the traffic state on road
state; otherwise, it is in congested state. aij refers to the
sections accurately [8]. It is defined as the average travel
time of vehicles on road sections of certain length. adjacency relationship between intersection i and j . If
Considering the influence of road grading standards on they are connected directly, then aij = 1 ; otherwise,
congestion level, the traffic state coefficient should be aij = 0 .
revised according to saturation submultiples for different
grade of road sections (Table 2). B. Analytic Hierarchy Model of Traffic State on Road
Network
Table 2. Saturation submultiples for road grading standards For further study on the potential relationship of
Road Grading Freeway Arterial Collector Local
intersections on road network, the analytic hierarchy of
network under different traffic state is described with the
Saturation
Submultiples
0.80～1.00 0.75～0.95 0.75～0.95 0.70～0.90 following steps [11].
Step 1 R (t ) is classified into two sets, noted as R ( Sij )
B. Fuzzy Identification Method Based on Cloud Theory and A( Sij ) . Where, R ( Sij ) is the parent set of Sij and
In a cloud model, the overall properties of a qualitative contains all the elements in touch of Sij ; while A( Sij ) is the
concept are expressed by three digital characteristics such
as expected value, entropy and excess entropy, noted as subset of Sij and contains all the elements attached to Sij .
C( Ex , En , He ) [9][10]. Step 2 Search for Sij that makes R ( Sij ) becoming the
Normal cloud model is the most commonly used cloud subset of A( Sij ) . Then Sij is defined as the element at the
model. The mathematical expectation curve (MEC) of highest level of system.
normal cloud is expressed: Step 3 Conceal the highest level and repeat Step 2.
The second highest level of system is found out, which is
MECA( x) = EXP[−( x − Ex) 2 /(2 En 2 )] followed by analytic hierarchy of the system until the
(1)
lowest level is determined.
Membership degree is calculated with equation (2): According to the analytic hierarchy model above,
traffic state on road network can be analyzed in detail.
( xi − Ex) 2 IV. CASE STUDY
ui = EXP[ ]
2 Eni’ 2 (2)
A. Road Network around Wuchang Railway Station
Where, ui denotes membership degree; xi denotes A case study was made for the road network around
the data in random sample obeyed normal distribution Wuchang Railway Station. The predigested structure of
with expected value as Ex and standard error as En ; road network is shown in Figure 2. Where, fij is the traffic
En’i denotes the data in random sample obeyed flow on road section from intersection i to j . Sij (t ) is the
N( En , He ). traffic state coefficient of fij . The arrows indicate the
III. TRAFFIC STATE IDENTIFICATION FOR ROAD direction of traffic flow on road sections.
NETWORK

A. Traffic State Judgment Matrix

Traffic state judgment matrix, noted as R (t ) ,
represents the accessibility of intersections on road
network under a certain level of congestion.
Suppose rij (t ) is the element of judgment matrix. If Figure 2. Road network around Wuchang Railway Station
intersection i and j are connected and the traffic state on
road sections is below the critical level of congestion, then Investigation of traffic state for five typical
rij = 1 ; otherwise, rij = 0 . intersections in regional area was made during rush hours
R (t ) is obtained by iteration computation: on weekdays. By simple random sampling, travel time of
vehicles on each road sections was gained. The survey data
concerned grading standards and geometry measurement
R(t ) = C (t )× C (t ) ⋅ ⋅ ⋅ C (t )
 
of road sections and so on.
n +1 (3)

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 According to the investigation, the state coefficient of
traffic flow on each road section is calculated, as shown in ⎡1 0 0 0 0⎤ ⎡1 0 1 0 0⎤ ⎡1 0 1 0 0⎤
⎢0 ⎢0 1 0 0 0 ⎥⎥ ⎢1 1 1 0 0 ⎥⎥
1 0 0 0 ⎥⎥
Table 3. ⎢ ⎢ ⎢
R (t ) ⎢1 0 1 0 0⎥ ⎢1 0 1 0 0⎥ ⎢1 0 1 0 0⎥
⎢ ⎥ ⎢ ⎥ ⎢ ⎥
Table 3. Traffic state coefficient for road network ⎢0 0 0 1 0⎥
⎢0 0 0 1 0⎥ ⎢0 0 0 1 0⎥
⎢⎣ 0 0 0 1 1 ⎥⎦ ⎢⎣1 1 1 1 1 ⎦⎥
⎣⎢ 0 0 0 1 1 ⎦⎥
Traffic Traffic
Name of Road Sij (t ) Sij (t )
Flow Flow
Ziyang Road f 12 0.1098 f 21 0.0461 The hierarchy of road network under different
Zhonghua Road f 13 0.0348 f 31 0.0290 congestion level was analyzed in Figure 3~Figure 5.
Wenan Road f 23 0.0671 f 32 0.0741
T-shaped Bridge Road f 25 0.0667 f 52 0.0510
Xongchu Road f 43 0.1124

B. Traffic State Identification for Road Sections

When road is overcrowded, it is no longer effective to
take measures by traffic control and guidance. Thus the
severely congested state was not taken into account in this
case. The available set of traffic state was described as Figure 3. The hierarchy for congested road network
follows:

A = {i = 1(free), i = 2(slightly congested), i = 3(congested)}

By cloud transform of traffic state coefficient, the

digital characteristics of cloud model for three types of
traffic state were obtained:
C1 ( Ex , En , He ) = (0.0313, 0.0015, 0.0002)
C2 ( Ex , En , He ) = (0.0397, 0.0035, 0.0003) Figure 4. The hierarchy for slightly congested road network
C3 ( Ex , En , He ) = (0.0665, 0.0160, 0.0013)
As Ziyang Road, Selection, Zhonghua Road and T-
shaped Bridge Road are three of the most important roads
on the network, the traffic state of f 21 , f 13 and f 52 were
studied typically. According to the membership degree of
state coefficients to possible cloud fields, the membership
cloud was selected and traffic state was identified Figure 5. The hierarchy for free road network
correspondingly. In this way, an uncertainty conversion
between qualitative concept and quantitative value was The following conclusions can be drawn from the
completed. hierarchy model:
• The traffic accessibility is better for intersections
Table 4. Traffic state identification at the upper level of road network. As seen in the
Possible
figures above, under different congestion level,
Traffic
Flow
Sij (t ) Cloud
Membership
Degree
Membership
Cloud
Traffic
State
intersection 4 stays at the highest level of network
Fields
Slightly
with the best accessibility. On the actual road
f 21 0.0510 {2、3} {0.9998,0.5688} 2
congested network, Lianxi Temple Road is a local accessed
f 13 0.0348 {1、2} {0.9933,0.7828} 1 Free to intersection 4. With a small traffic volume on
f 52 0.0461 {2、3} {0.9971,0.6579} 2
Slightly the road, traffic flow runs with low density but
congested high speed. As traffic state coefficient is less than
C. Traffic State Identification for Road Network the critical level of congestion, this road is
expedited at most of the time.
The critical level of traffic state was determined by the • The bottleneck intersection and key sections can
expected value of cloud model. According to the above
be found from the hierarchy of road network. The
analysis, the traffic state judgment matrix for road network
key road section is connected with the bottleneck
was derived, as shown in Table 5.
intersection at the middle level of network. In this
case, intersection 2 and 5 are the key intersections
Table 5. Traffic state judgment matrix and T-shaped Bridge Road is the key road section.
Traffic
Free
Slightly
Congested
The traffic state of road network is influenced by
State congested the accessibility of bottleneck intersections and
λ 0.0313 0.0397 0.0665 connectivity of key sections.
• According to the number of hierarchy, the
diversity of traffic state on road network can be
analyzed. The larger the number of hierarchy is,
the greater the diversity will be. Generally, they
are positively correlated. When all the

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 intersections stay at the same level, it is indicated
that all sections on road network tend to be in the
same traffic state.
• The Change of traffic state on road network can
also be seen from the number of isolated
intersections. When there are more isolated
intersections, the majority of road traffic state
coefficients is greater than the critical level of
congestion, which indicates a poor connectivity of
road sections.
V. CONCLUSIONS
Aimed at the limitation of traffic state identification for
urban road network, a cloud theory based fuzzy
identification method was proposed. By constructing
traffic state judgment matrix, the hierarchy of road
network under different congestion level was analyzed. A
case study on the road network around Wuchang Railway
Station showed that, the identification result conformed to
actual situation. It has some theoretical significance for
traffic management, control and guidance for bottleneck
intersection and key road sections.
However, this method requires a large-sized and
typical sample to ensure the accuracy of identification
results. When it is difficult to collect a reasonable sample,
the effectiveness and practicability of model still remains
to be further studied.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This work was supported by National Natural Science
Fund (50778141), National Basic Research “973” Program
of China (2006CB705505) and National Key Technology
R&D Program (2006BAJ18B07-01).
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