Toward Intelligent Variable Message Signs in Freeway Work Zones: Neural Network Model

An increasingly popular method of managing freeway traffic is to use variable message signs (VMS). A neural network model is presented for real-time control of a VMS system in freeway work zones. The neural network is trained to detect the start of a queue in a work zone and provide a message in the freeway upstream. The travelers are informed about the congestion in a work zone when a queue starts to form. The intelligent VMS system can be trained with data for different periods within a day, such as morning and evening rush hours, nonrush hours during the day, and night, for a more detailed traffic flow prediction over the period of one day. Two different neural network training rules are used: the simple backpropagation (BP) and the Levenberg-Marquardt BP algorithms. The network is trained using data adapted from the measured data. Based on different numerical experiments it is observed that the convergence speed of the Levenberg-Marquardt BP algorithm is at least one order of magnitude faster than the simple BP algorithm for the work zone traffic queue detection problem.