An Automobile Control Method for Alleviation of Traffic Congestions Using Inter-Vehicle Ad Hoc Communication in Lattice-Like Roads

Since losing costs and spending time which are caused by traffic congestions are large, methods for alleviation of traffic congestions are required. So far, some methods (ex. car navigation system or vehicle information and communication system (VICS), which shows a route that avoids points of traffic congestion) have been developed as commercial products. These commercial products could cause other traffic congestions by the following mechanism. When a traffic congestion is recognized by the products, the method installed in the products tries to find a route where travelling time becomes shortest. As a result, many drivers, who equip the products, choose the same route. It causes other traffic congestions on the route. We intend to achieve an automobile control system where each driver obtains traffic information adaptively and it helps to alleviate traffic congestions. For such automobile control system, in this paper we propose an automobile control method for alleviation of traffic congestion using inter-vehicle ad hoc communication in lattice-like roads. In the proposed method, each automobile broadcasts information of the automobile, the information is relayed in multi-hop transmissions, and each automobile obtains information of automobiles. The automobile can therefore calculate an appropriate route based on the obtained information. Also, this paper presents simulation evaluations on the proposed method.