Optimization of merging pedestrian flows based on adaptive dynamic programming

Document Type

Conference Proceeding

Date of Original Version

7-1-2019

Abstract

Pedestrian flows in densely-populated areas may cause crowd accidents, and effective pedestrian flow regulation is highly desirable for flow optimization. In this paper, we investigate the problem of regulating two merging pedestrian flows by introducing a mobile robot moving within the flow. The pedestrian flows are regulated through dynamic human-robot interaction during their collective motion. We propose a method based on adaptive dynamic programming (ADP) to learn the optimal motion control of the robot in real time and the pedestrian outflow through the bottleneck area is maximized. Extensive simulations are performed using social force models of pedestrian motion. Simulation results show that the pedestrian outflow is significantly improved with our proposed ADP control.

Publication Title, e.g., Journal

Proceedings of the American Control Conference

Volume

2019-July

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