Quantify the Road Link Performance and Capacity Using Deep Learning Models

The link performance and capacity are important quantitative features in road link performance assessment, and they play vital roles in many important transportation tasks, e.g., traffic assignment and dynamic routing. However, it remains a challenging task to quantify them, particularly in a dynamic traffic scenario requiring an accurate, fast, and dynamic output. This study proposes a tailored deep learning framework for the addressed problem, which combines important transport domain knowledge reflected by the Bureau of Public Road (BPR) link performance function. In specifics, the calibration of link performance function and the estimation of link travel time are combined in the proposed framework and realized by two neural network modules. Numerical experiments demonstrate the capability of the proposed framework to capture complex relationships between dynamic link capacity and various factors and show its value in estimating link travel time.