Origin of synchronized traffic flow on highways and its dynamic phase transitions
Statistical Mechanics
2009-10-31 v1
Abstract
We study the traffic flow on a highway with ramps through numerical simulations of a hydrodynamic traffic flow model. It is found that the presence of the external vehicle flux through ramps generates a new state of recurring humps (RH). This novel dynamic state is characterized by temporal oscillations of the vehicle density and velocity which are localized near ramps, and found to be the origin of the synchronized traffic flow reported recently [PRL 79, 4030 (1997)]. We also argue that the dynamic phase transitions between the free flow and the RH state can be interpreted as a subcritical Hopf bifurcation.
Cite
@article{arxiv.cond-mat/9805097,
title = {Origin of synchronized traffic flow on highways and its dynamic phase transitions},
author = {H. Y. Lee and H. -W. Lee and D. Kim},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/9805097},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
4 pages, source TeX file and 4 figures are tarred and compressed via uufiles