Traffic Density Estimation for Single and Multilane Traffic

Modifications are proposed for an algorithm that estimates the number of vehicles on a section, of highway from a time series of flow and velocity measurements. The effect of alternate assumptions concerning the nature of the velocity field between points of measurement is explored. In addition a simplification is proposed to avoid solution by successive approximation of certain transcendental equations. The net result is an algorithm that is more practical and provides generally superior performance than the original. Various algorithms are evaluated for both single and multilane traffic.