Super-random states in vehicular traffic — Detection & explanation

Abstract

This article deals with specific states of traffic flow on a two-lane freeway, in which statistical fluctuations of microscopic quantities (inter-vehicle gaps) are significantly higher than in systems with absolutely random events (Poisson systems). These anomalous states (super-random) are detected in empirical traffic data, specifically in the fast lane at traffic densities up to 25 vehicles per kilometer. The origin of these states is then explained mathematically (using the theory of balance particle systems and tools of random matrix theory), physically (by means of an one-dimensional particle gas subjected to local perturbations caused by overtaking cars) and empirically (using an analogy with phenomena observed in photon counting experiments). In the article we show that overtaking maneuvers, when vehicles from a slow lane are injected into a fast-lane stream of faster moving vehicles, disrupt a local balance in microstructure of fast-lane stream and cause atypical arrangement of vehicular positions, that is very rare, generally. With help of original numerical model we demonstrate that the anomalous states detected are identical to equilibrium states formed in a stochastic particle gas with a potential containing, in addition to a repulsive component, also an attractive component.