Freeway Traffic Control Considering Capacity Drop Phenomena: Comparison of Different MPC Schemes

This paper proposes different MPC-based traffic controllers in order to reduce congestion in freeway systems via ramp metering. These controllers differ for the adopted prediction model and for the considered cost function to be minimized. In particular, both a standard CTM and a CTM modified version representing the capacity drop phenomenon are used, while the two different cost functions considered penalize congested states in different ways. These MPC controllers are compared via simulation, both evaluating the performances of the controlled freeway system in the different cases, and from a computational point of view.