Macroscopic traffic flow model propagation stability for adaptive cruise controlled vehicles

Traffic flow propagation stability is concerned about the property whether a traffic flow perturbation will propagate. In this paper, we study a macroscopic model for traffic flow in which each individual vehicle is controlled by an adaptive cruise control spacing policy. The transformed macroscopic model is discussed for the properties of describing the propagation of perturbations along the equilibrium traffic flow and a nonlinear traffic flow stability criterion is investigated using a wavefront expansion technique. Finally, A numerical example is provided and shows the property of traffic wave.