A lot of time and energy is wasted when vehicles are waiting for an intersection while nobody is moving. To improve this, it is important to have an optimal switching scheme between the red, amber, and green phases. Nowadays there are three main methods to implement a switching scheme. The first one is using fixed-time control, which is implemented based on historical data. The second one uses vehicle-actuated control, which reacts on the presence of vehicles or other road users. The last method is traffic responsive control, which looks at the traffic demand. The difference is that a vehicle-actuated controller looks if it is possible to safely terminate a green phase for one direction, while the traffic-responsive controller takes the whole intersection into account and makes a decision to either switch green phases or prolong the current green phase.
To better control traffic, intelligent traffic control systems are in development. These intelligent systems do not only emit data, but they also gather data from vehicles. Using this data it is possible to better control the switching scheme of intersections.
In this project new intelligent traffic control systems are investigated and their use is tested. Next, the development and validation of a model to control multiple intelligent traffic signals, with the help of parametrized control, is foreseen.