Applications of Petri networks to transportation network modeling

The development of a mathematical modular framework based on Petri network (PN) theory to model a traffic network is the subject of this paper. Traffic intersections are the primitive elements of a transportation network and are characterized as event-driven and asynchronous systems. Petri networks have been utilized to model these discrete event systems; further analysis of their structure can reveal information relevant to the concurrency, parallelism, synchronization, and deadlock avoidance issues. The Petri-net model of a generic traffic junction is presented, with its deadlock avoidance property proven. These modular networks are effective in synchronizing their components and can be used for modeling of an asynchronous large-scale transportation system. The derived model is suitable for simulations on a multiprocessor computer since its program execution safety is secured. The software pseudocode for simulating a transportation network model on a multiprocessor system is presented.