An improved lattice hydrodynamic model considering the driver's desire of driving smoothly

Besides the forward vehicles' traffic situation, driving behaviors may be influenced by the driver's desire of driving smoothly, which is embodied by the fact that many drivers like to adjust current traffic situation to the optimal steady state. With the consideration of the effect of driver's desire of driving smoothly, an improved lattice hydrodynamic model is proposed in this paper. The analytical stability criterion is derived by the linear analysis method. And then the modified KdV equation is deduced to describe the characteristic of traffic jams near the critical point. In addition, the numerical simulations are presented to investigate the effect of the factor contained herein on the traffic stability. The analytical and numerical results all show that traffic jams can be effectively relieved when the factor of driver's desire of driving smoothly is incorporated into the traffic model. (C) 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.