Macroscopic Fundamental Diagram for Brisbane, Australia

The macroscopic fundamental diagram (MFD) relates space mean density and flow. The existence with dynamic features was confirmed in a congested urban network in downtown Yokohama, Japan, with a real data set. Because the MFD represents areawide network traffic performance, studies have reported on perimeter control strategies and areawide traffic state estimated with the MFD concept. However, few reports of real-world examples from signalized arterial networks are available. Data are fused from multiple sources (Bluetooth devices, loop detectors, and signal phase timing). A framework is presented for the development of the MFD for Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. Existence of the MFD in the Brisbane arterial network is confirmed. MFDs (from the entire network and several subregions) are evaluated to determine the spatial partitioning to represent network performance. The findings confirm the usefulness of appropriate network partitioning for traffic monitoring and incident detection. Future research directions are addressed.