SCOOT data and route guidance

The SCOOT urban traffic control system has been designed to improve traffic control by calculating and implementing optimum signal timings to give minimum overall network delay. a key feature of SCOOT is its traffic model which predicts the main elements of traffic performance-such as flow, delay stops and congestion-from information received every second from detectors on each link in the network. In addition to its use for network control, this up-to-the-minute information is available for any other purpose and can be obtained via standard SCOOT messages at a variety of levels of detail. The paper describes the characteristics and accuracy of the data available from SCOOT which could be useful for route guidance and discusses possible ways in which the data may be used for this purpose