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Clustering on the highway

A notorious example of clustering is the formation of traffic jams on the highway.


Just as in the case of the inelastically colliding granular particles,
the interactions between the car drivers typically reduce the
overall velocity. And with precisely the same result: dense
clusters of slowly moving cars.

An adapted version of our flux model has successfully been
applied to predict traffic jams on the highway A58 between
the Dutch cities of Breda and Eindhoven (see Publ. 51).

Understanding the formation of traffic jams, and being able
to predict them, is a crucial step in the ongoing worldwide
effort to keep them under control. Any small progress in this
direction will mean an enormous gain in terms of
money, time, and environment.


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