Traffic peak period detection using traffic index cloud maps

Abstract

Traffic peak period detection is one key issue in ITS research area, which can afford time information for traffic flow guidance. Classical methods devote themselves to detect the peak period of road segmentations and small road network areas. Namely, these methods focus on traffic peak period detection in small space scale. However, the traffic peak periods of road segmentations and small road network areas cannot present the traffic peak periods of the whole city. In fact, the traffic peak periods of the whole city are more important for the traffic administration department. To solve this problem, a new method for detecting traffic peak periods of the whole city is proposed, which is based on the traffic index cloud maps. Experimental results on the GPS data show that the proposed method can recognize the traffic peak periods in a large space scale accurately.