About the project

Traffic jams are a major discomfort for the road user. On top of this they lead to societal costs estimated up to €1.8 billion annually in the Netherlands.

Not all traffic jams need to be there: some occur while there is still spare road capacity left. One cause of these traffic jams is unbalanced lane use. More people may choose to drive on a specific lane than others, which creates a situation where small disturbances easily grow into traffic jams.

The aim of the project is to optimise lane use with a lane-specific control application. By evening out traffic over the available lanes, we can drastically reduce traffic jams. In addition to this, a more balanced traffic systems leads to increased safety and reduced emissions.

Working with STW, Rijkswaterstaat and several partners from the industry we aim to reduce congestion by providing lane-specific advice to drivers.

Activities:

Taking the Fast Lane will develop an innovative system to reduce unnecessary traffic jams. This system is a first of its kind.

 In order to achieve this goal, we will develop:

•   A cutting edge traffic state estimation model to identify potential traffic jams before they occur;

•  An optimised driver interface to safely communicate the benefits to the driver and encourage congestion reducing behaviour;

•   A state-of-the-art vehicle positioning system that is accurate enough to see at what lane you are driving. This enables lane-specific control decisions.

The use of traffic flow simulation models, a driving simulator and an instrumented vehicle provide a realistic research environment, culminating in a live prototype implementation in real traffic.

Goals and activities

Research themes