Integrating fluctuations into distribution of resources in transportation networks

We propose a resource distribution strategy to reduce the average travel time in a transportation network given a fixed generation rate. Suppose that there are essential resources to avoid congestion in the network as well as some extra resources. The strategy distributes the essential resources by the average loads on the vertices and integrates the fluctuations of the instantaneous loads into the distribution of the extra resources. The fluctuations are calculated with the assumption of unlimited resources, where the calculation is incorporated into the calculation of the average loads without adding to the time complexity. Simulation results show that the fluctuation-integrated strategy provides shorter average travel time than a previous distribution strategy while keeping similar robustness. The strategy is especially beneficial when the extra resources are scarce and the network is heterogeneous and lowly loaded.