About three weeks ago, I gave a presentation at the TRB Joint Traffic Analysis and Modeling Workshop organised by the TRB Committee on Highway Capacity & Quality of Service and TRB Standing Committee - Traffic Simulation. The PowerPoint presentation with Slide Notes in a separate document (PDF copies) are now available for download from our Publications web page (https://lnkd.in/g3bNmRq).

The presentation recommends that formal procedures (guidelines) are developed for CROSS-VERIFICATION of analytical and microsimulation models using the well-established micro-analytical and microsimulation concepts. This effort should aim to provide MODEL TRANSPARENCY which is essential for the model users to understand the model output that the software generates. This approach revisits concepts first proposed a quarter-century ago but not widely implemented.

The process of cross-verification (benchmarking) recommended to measure the compatibility between microsimulation and analytical models used in traffic engineering requires paying attention to details of model elements. The presentation discusses a number of key model elements that apply to analytical and microsimulation models. An example for one of them, the importance of consistent definitions of traffic performance parameters, is shown in the image attached.

Smart modelers are those who understand the methods and concepts used by the models they use. Cross-verification of micro-analytical and microsimulation models will lead to these two modeling approaches supporting each other; thus, it will help the modeling profession greatly.

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