Efficient optimization methods for freeway management and control

Due to the rapid growth of human population, and jobs being distributed unevenly in different locations, daily commuting is required more than ever, which in its turn is creating a huge socio-economic issue: traffic congestion. In order to prevent, or at least to alleviate this problem, trafficmanagement and control is urgently required. This...

Modeling and Control of Switching Max-Plus-Linear Systems: Rescheduling of railway traffic and changing gaits in legged locomotion

The operation of many systems can be described by the timing of events. When the system behavior can be described by equations that are "linear'' in the max-plus algebra, which has maximization and addition as its basic operations, the system is called a max-plus-linear system. In many of these systems the order of the events may need to be...

Optimal and Robust Switching Control Strategies: Theory, and Applications in Traffic Management

Macroscopic modeling, predictive and robust control and route guidance for large-scale freeway and urban traffic networks are the main focus of this thesis. In order to increase the efficiency of our control strategies, we propose several mathematical and optimization techniques. Moreover, in the second part of the thesis, based on the hybrid...

Optimal Trajectory Planning and Train Scheduling for Railway Systems

Safe, fast, punctual, energy-efficient, and comfortable rail traffic systems are important for rail operators, passengers, and the environment. Due to the increasing energy prices and environmental concerns, the reduction of energy consumption has become one of the key objectives for railway systems. On the other hand, with the increase of...

Finite Abstractions of Max-Plus-Linear Systems: Theory and Algorithms

Max-Plus-Linear (MPL) systems are a class of discrete-event systems with a continuous state space characterizing the timing of the underlying sequential discrete events. These systems are predisposed to describe the timing synchronization between interleaved processes. MPL systems are employed in the analysis and scheduling of infrastructure...

Reverse Stackelberg Games: Theory and Applications in Traffic Control

One of the major challenges in optimization-based control of large-scale intelligent infrastructural networks such as traffic networks is to find efficient multilevel optimization schemes through which decisions can be made by agents or controllers of different interacting layers. The hierarchical game on which this dissertation is focused can...

Approximation Methods in Stochastic Max-Plus Systems

Stochastic max-plus systems belong to a special class of discrete-event systems. This class consists of systems with synchronization but no choice and the models of such systems are defined using the operators maximization and addition. Stochastic max-plus systems can be further extended to stochastic switching max-plus systems and stochastic...

Distributed model predictive controller design based on distributed optimization

Model-Based Traffic Control for Sustainable Mobility

Computationally efficient dynamic fuel consumption, emissions, and dispersion of emissions models are developed. Fast and practically feasible model-based controller is proposed. Using the developed models, the controller steers the traffic flow in such a way that a balanced trade-off between the travel times, fuel consumption, and emissions (to...

Efficient model predictive control for large-scale urban traffic networks

Model Predictive Control is applied to control and coordinate large-scale urban traffic networks. However, due to the large scale or the nonlinear, non-convex nature of the on-line optimization problems solved, the MPC controllers become real-time infeasible in practice, even though the problem is solvable in theory. In this thesis, we mainly...

Ant Colony Optimization for Control

The very basis of this thesis is the collective behavior of ants in colonies. Ants are an excellent example of how rather simple behavior on a local level can lead to complex behavior on a global level that is beneficial for the individuals. The key in the self-organization of ants is communication through pheromones. When an ant forages for...

Integrated Control of Mixed Traffic Networks using Model Predictive Control

Motivation The growth of our road infrastructure cannot keep up with the growing mobility of people, and the corresponding increase in traffic demand. This results in daily congestion on the freeways. It is an illusion that the problem of congestion can be solved completely within a few years, but it is possible to improve the current situation....

Model-Based Control for Postal Automation and Baggage Handling

In this thesis we focus on two specific transportation systems, namely postal automation and baggage handling. Postal automation: During the last decades the volume of magazines, catalogs, and other plastic wrapped mail items that have to be processed by post sorting centers has increased considerably. In order to be able to handle the large...

Traffic management and control in intelligent vehicle highway systems

Traffic congestion is a problem experienced daily by most of us. Among various traffic management schemes, efficient utilisation of the existing roadside infrastructure combined with in-vehicle technologies offers a promising solution to address traffic congestion and related problems. This approach has resulted in the development of Intelligent...

Distributed Fuzzy and Stochastic Observers for Nonlinear Systems

Many problems in decision making, control, and monitoring require that all variables of interest, usually states and parameters of the system, are known at all times. However, in practical situations, not all variables are measurable or they are not measured due to technical or economical reasons. Therefore, these variables need to be estimated...

Multi-Agent Look-Ahead Traffic-Adaptive Control

The objective of this thesis is to create a distributed, multi-agent, approach to traffic control. This PhD thesis' focus is on the control of a network instrumented by traffic signals.A thorough literature study has been performed, reviewing the current state of the art in traffic signal control. On the basis of this literature survey, a...

Multi-agent model predictive control with applications to power networks

Transportation networks, such as power networks, road traffic networks, water distribution networks, railway networks, etc., are the corner stones of our modern society. As transportation networks have to operate closer and closer to their capacity limits and as the dynamics of these networks become more and more complex, control of these...

Design and validation of advanced driver assistance systems

This thesis presents new tools and methods for the design and validation of advanced driver assistance systems (ADASs). ADASs aim to improve driving comfort and traffic safety by assisting the driver in recognizing and reacting to potentially dangerous traffic situations. A major challenge in designing these systems is to guarantee high...