Instantaneous control for traffic flow

The solution methods for optimal control problems with coupled partial differential equations as constraints are computationally costly and memory intensive; in particular for problems stated on networks, this prevents the methods from being relevant. We present instantaneous control problems for the optimization of traffic flow problems on road networks. We derive the optimality conditions, investigate the relation to the full optimal control problem and prove that certain properties of the optimal control problem carry over to the instantaneous one. We propose a solution algorithm and compare quality of the computed controls and run‐times. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.