A mobility-aware network selection method for vehicle-to-infrastructure communication over LTE-A multi-tier networks

The Long Term Evolution-Advanced (LTE-A) is a promising technology to support vehicular communication. In an LTE-A multi-tier network, macro cell networks can overlay multiple small cell networks of different sizes, such as femto and pico, to improve the overall capacity and quality of service. However, multi-tier networks can result in frequent unwanted handover activities, unnecessary scanning of small cell networks and reduced throughput leading to a degradation of the overall network performance. Here we propose a mobility-aware network selection method in a multi-tier network where an LTE-A user equipment (UE) can self-select a suitable target network for handover depending on the direction of its mobility, its dwelling time within the coverage area of a network and the received signal strength from the base station or Evolved Node B (eNB) of a network. Simulation results show that our method can improve the network packet delivery ratio by 20% and reduce the end-to-end delay by 14%.