Analysis on traffic congestion propagation influenced by traffic congestion information

The effectiveness of traveler information is increasing and information plays an important role on the improvement of the status of urban transportation network jams. In this paper, the mathematical model was formulated to describe the effectiveness of traffic jams information under the assumption of simple network and linear cost function. The impact of traffic congestion information on congestion propagation was investigated by using two models namely stochastic and deterministic user equilibrium assignment. The study deduced some significant conclusions: (1) In the critical range of flux, congestion information provision can ameliorate the existing traffic conditions and decrease the average network travel cost of individuals; (2) the critical interval of flux´s variation between two routes was existent which substituted route didn´t generate jams; (3) the savings of personal cost decreased and the total savings of network increased along with the increase of total flux N.