Video processing techniques for traffic flow monitoring: A survey

Video-based traffic flow monitoring is a fast emerging field based on the continuous development of computer vision. A survey of the state-of-the-art video processing techniques in traffic flow monitoring is presented in this paper. Firstly, vehicle detection is the first step of video processing and detection methods are classified into background modeling based methods and non-background modeling based methods. In particular, nighttime detection is more challenging due to bad illumination and sensitivity to light. Then tracking techniques, including 3D model-based, region-based, active contour-based and feature-based tracking, are presented. A variety of algorithms including MeanShift algorithm, Kalman Filter and Particle Filter are applied in tracking process. In addition, shadow detection and vehicles occlusion bring much trouble into vehicle detection, tracking and so on. Based on the aforementioned video processing techniques, discussion on behavior understanding including traffic incident detection is carried out. Finally, key challenges in traffic flow monitoring are discussed.