Agents meet Traffic Simulation, Control and Management: A Review of Selected Recent Contributions

In the last decades, transport demand has increasedquickly due to several concurrent factors. The negative impacts ofincreased demand have many effects on both travelers themselvesand communities and some actions need to mitigate them. Tothis purpose, progresses in different scientific fields as computerscience, electronic, communication as well as studies on new andmore sophisticated traffic simulation models contributed to realizeIntelligent Transport Systems (ITSs), which provide advancedtransport services for a better and efficient use of transport networks.The adoption of the software agent technology has givena significant contribution to the ITS development, due to theircapability to both simulate traffic scenarios at different levelsof detail and provide intelligent decision-making frameworks.Intelligent agents make it possible to study human behaviors andmachine-to-machine interactions with the aim to simulate, controland manage transportation networks. Given their relevance, inthe last years a great body of researches and surveys have beenproposed in the literature on this matter. This paper wantsto contribute by providing an overview of the most significantadvancements produced during the period 2013- 2015.