Freeway Traffic Modelling and Control

This monograph provides an extended overview of modelling and control approaches for freeway traffic systems, moving from the early methods to the most recent scientific results and field implementations. The concepts of green traffic systems and smart mobility are addressed in the book, since a modern freeway traffic management system should be designed to be sustainable. Future perspectives on freeway traffic control are also analysed and discussed with reference to the most recent technological advancements

The most widespread modelling and control techniques for freeway traffic systems are treated with mathematical rigour, but also discussed with reference to their performance assessment and to the expected impact of their practical usage in real traffic systems. In order to make the book accessible to readers of different backgrounds, some fundamental aspects of traffic theory as well as some basic control concepts, useful for better understanding the addressed topics, are provided in the book.

This monograph can be used as a textbook for courses on transport engineering, traffic management and control. It is also addressed to experts working in traffic monitoring and control areas and to researchers, technicians and practitioners of both transportation and control engineering. The authors’ systematic vision of traffic modelling and control methods developed over decades makes the book a valuable survey resource for freeway traffic managers, freeway stakeholders and transportation public authorities with professional interests in freeway traffic systems.

Advances in Industrial Control reports and encourages the transfer of technology in control engineering. The rapid development of control technology has an impact on all areas of the control discipline. The series offers an opportunity for researchers to present an extended exposition of new work in all aspects of industrial control. 

Antonella Ferrara was born in Genova, Italy. As a student at the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Genova, she got the "IEEE North Italy Section Electrical Engineering Student Award" in 1986. She received the Laurea Degree (Cum Laude and printing honours) in Electronic Engineering in 1987 and the Ph.D. in Computer Science and Electronics in 1992 from the University of Genova. She was Assistant Professor in the Department of Communication, Computer and System Sciences of the University of Genova from 1992 to 1998. In November 1998 she became Associate Professor of Automatic Control at the University of Pavia. Since January 2005 she is Full Professor of Automatic Control in the Department of Electrical, Computer and Biomedical Engineering (ECBE) of the University of Pavia. Her research activities are mainly in the area of sliding mode control and nonlinear control, with application to traffic control, automotive control, process control, and robotics. She was a coordinator and member of several research units in national and European research projects. She was scientific responsible of several research projects funded or co-funded by companies. She has authored or co-authored more than 300 papers, including more than 100 international journal papers. From 2000 to 2004 she was Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology, and, from 2007 to 2012, Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control. Since 2014 she has been Associate Editor of the IEEE Control Systems Magazine, and, since 2017, Subject Editor of the International Journal of Robust and Nonlinear Control. She currently is and has been member of the International Program Committee of numerous international conferences and events. She is Editor of the 15th IFAC Symposium on Control in Transportation Systems CTS 2018 (Savona, Italy, June 2018). She is Senior Member of the IEEE Control Systems Society, member of the IEEE Technical Committee on Variable Structure and Sliding Mode Control, member of the IEEE Technical Committee on Automotive Control, and member of the IFAC Technical Committee on Transportation Systems. She has been appointed member of the Board of Governors of the IEEE Control Systems Society for 2012, and is elected member for the triennium 2016-2018. She was Chair of the Women in Control Standing Committee of the IEEE Control Systems Society, still being a member of the Advisory Board of that committee. She is member of the European Control Association (EUCA) Council. 

Simona Sacone was born in Loano (SV), Italy. She received the 'Laurea' degree in Electronic Engineering (110/110 cum Laude) from the University of Genova in 1992 and the Ph.D. degree in Electronic Engineering and Computer Science in 1997 from the same university. From 1999 to 2008 she has been Assistant Professor of Automatic Control at the Department of Communication, Computer and System Sciences of the University of Genova. Since 2008 she is Associate Professor of Automatic Control first in the Department of Communication, Computer and System Sciences of the University of Genova and, then, in the newborn Department of Informatics, Bioengineering, Robotics and Systems Engineering. She is coordinator of the PhD Course on Systems Engineering at the University of Genova. She has been and presently is coordinator of several national and international research projects as well as of research activities funded or co-funded by Companies. Her research interests are referred to discrete-event and hybrid modelling, optimization and control with application to production processes, transportation systems and logistic networks. The specific application field of freeway traffic systems has been dedicated a significant part of her research activity. She has authored and co-authored more than 150 papers published on international journals, international books and international conference proceedings. In 2012 the paper “Freeway networks as Systems of Systems: an event-triggered distributed control scheme” presented at the 7th International Conference on System of Systems Engineering has received the Best Student Paper award. She has organized several invited sessions and tracks at international conferences and in 2016 she was Guest Editor of one special issue on the International Journal of Robust and Nonlinear Control. Presently, she is Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems and of the IEEE Control Systems Magazine. She also serves as Associate Editor in several international conferences as the IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems, the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation and the IFAC/IEEE Workshop on Discrete Event Systems. She is Member of the IEEE Control Systems Society and of the IFAC Technical Committees 1.3 on Discrete Event and Hybrid Systems and 7.4 on Transportation Systems. In 2017 she has been elected Chair of the Technical Committee on Logistics of the IEEE Intelligent Transportation Systems Society. She will be the Chair of the National Organizing Committee of CTS 2018, the 15th IFAC Symposium on Control in Transportation Systems, which will be held in 2018 in Savona, University of Genova, Italy.

Silvia Siri was born in Savona, Italy. She received the Master Degree in Management Engineering in 2002 at the University of Genova (110/110 cum Laudem) and the Ph.D. Degree in Information and Communication Technologies in 2006 at the University of Genova. From November 2006 to December 2015 she was a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Genova. Since January 2016 she has been Assistant Professor of Automatic Control at the Department of Informatics, Bioengineering, Robotics and Systems Engineering, University of Genova. Her research interests regard the field of modelling, optimization and control of transportation systems. An important research area deals with freeway traffic systems, for which she has been studying both the modelling aspects and some innovative control schemes, mainly based on MPC techniques and event-triggered control concepts. She has been involved in numerous research projects at national or international level, both funded by public authorities or private companies. The main activities carried out in these projects have addressed the development of mathematical models, optimization or control techniques applied to seaport terminals, urban and freeway traffic systems and intermodal networks. She is co-author of more than 100 papers in international journals, international books and international conference proceedings and she serves as reviewer for international conferences and journals in the area of automatic control, operations research and transportation. Presently, she is Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transport Systems. Since 2012 she has been member of the IFAC Technical Committee TC 7.4 on Transportation Systems, for which she serves as Vice-Chair for Social Media, and since 2014 she has been member of IFAC Technical Committee TC 1.3 on Discrete Event and Hybrid Systems. Since 2013 she has been member of the Women in Control Standing Committee of the IEEE Control Systems Society and since 2017 Co-chair of the Technical Committee on Logistic Services of the IEEE Intelligent Transportation Systems Society. She has been and currently is member of the International Program Committee of numerous international conferences and events, in which she also serves as Associate Editor. She has organized different invited sessions and tracks at international conferences and in 2016 she was Guest Editor of one special issue on the International Journal of Robust and Nonlinear Control. She is now involved in the organization of the CTS 2018, 15th IFAC Symposium on Control in Transportation Systems, that will be held in 2018 in Savona, University of Genova, for which she has the role of Co-Chair of the National Organizing Committee.