Title: Reversible discrete event formulation and optimistic parallel execution of vehicular traffic models

Authors: Srikanth B. Yoginath, Kalyan S. Perumalla

Addresses: Oak Ridge National Laboratory, P.O. Box 2008, MS-6085, Oak Ridge, TN 37831, USA. ' Oak Ridge National Laboratory, P.O. Box 2008, MS-6085, Oak Ridge, TN 37831, USA

Abstract: Vehicular traffic simulations are useful in applications such as emergency planning and traffic management, for rapid response and resilience. Here, a parallel traffic simulation approach is presented that reduces the time for simulating emergency vehicular traffic scenarios. We use a reverse computation-based optimistic execution approach to parallel execution of microscopic, vehicular-level models of traffic. The unique aspects of this effort are: exploration of optimistic simulation of vehicular traffic; addressing the related reverse computation challenges; achieving absolute, as opposed to self-relative, speedup. The design, development and performance study of the parallel simulation system is presented, demonstrating excellent sequential and parallel performance. A speed up of nearly 20 on 32 processors is observed on a vehicular network of 65,000 intersections and 13 million vehicles.

Keywords: parallel simulation; discrete event simulation; reverse computation; vehicular simulation; traffic modelling; emergency planning; traffic management; emergency management; road networks; vehicles.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSPM.2009.028624

International Journal of Simulation and Process Modelling, 2009 Vol.5 No.2, pp.104 - 119

Received: 16 May 2008
Accepted: 13 Oct 2008
Published online: 21 Sep 2009 *

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