Gridlock! Modeling and Predicting Traffic Flow.

Team: 7

School: Albuquerque Academy

Area of Science: Urban Problems (Traffic)/ Behavior and Social Sci

Interim:

Problem Definition:
As Albuquerque continues to grow, its infrastructure continuously needs to be updated. This is evident throughout the city, with orange barrels and flashing signs present everywhere. This construction ultimately will help traffic flow, but for now is crippling to many a morning commute.

The goal of this project is to create a traffic simulation for the area surrounding the intersection of Academy and Wyoming. Both streets have recently been experiencing a lot of construction going in all directions and impacting our community. The program will take into account data from as many drivers as we can survey. Their data sets will include their age, gender, speeding and turn signal habits (self-reported). We will also utilize the city’s data for the intersection.

Problem Solution:
We plan on achieving our goal by simulating a set of cars that move in and out of the simulation area (represented by a graph of nodes) over time and looking at general trends in congestion and accident frequency. We will write code that simulates decision-making, and run it at regular time intervals in order to obtain this data. We will also experiment with modifications to the node graph and observe changes to traffic data.

Progress to date:
Our most significant progress to date is that we have narrowed our project to a more accurate scope for our programming abilities. We have identified a particularly problematic intersection to work on that will most greatly benefit our immediate community. We have begun work on setting up the skeleton mainframe of our code and preparing it to receive the “drivers” that we create. We also have gathered sources of data, both local and national, on driving habits and plan to send out a survey to the greater Albuquerque Academy community.

Expected Results:
After running our program we hope to be able to modify it to best reflect the actions of drivers on the road by modifying their frequencies of speeding, turn signal use etc. We also hope to be able to model the effect of the current construction on these streets and have it as a resource to plan when and where construction should occur. We expect that with enough tinkering, and hopefully a larger data set, the simulation could prove to be quite accurate.

Sources:

“Traffic Safety Facts” < http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/Pubs/811170.PDF>11/24/09

Mims, Jim. “C++ Manual.” 9/29/09

maps.google.com for a map of the area 11/21/09

City of Albuquerque. “Results of Red Light Camera Program.” 11/24/09

Avitia, Dulce, et al. “Emergency Evacuation Plan.” 11/24/09

Team Members:

  Amanda Burroughs
  Joesph Griego

Sponsoring Teacher: Jim Mims

Mail the entire Team