Real-Time Route Planning and Data Dissemination for Urban Scenarios Using the Internet of Things

Vehicular ad hoc networks (VANETs) have gained interest because of their applicability and significance in the fields of traffic management, road monitoring and safety, infotainment, and on-demand services. Route planning in vehicular networks based on efficient collection of real-time data can effectively mitigate traffic congestion problems in urban areas. Furthermore, real-time data is shared by using an effective sharing mechanism to avoid redundancy of the collected information. However, dynamic route replanning and effective sharing mechanisms based on real-time data are still challenging problems. Therefore, the aim of this article is to describe route planning and data dissemination in real time using the Internet of Things paradigm. This objective is achieved by a novel data dissemination technique for information sharing among the roadside units in a hybrid VANET intelligent transportation system (Hybrid- VITS). Hybrid-VITS comprises VANETs, vehicular traffic servers, and a 5G-based cellular system of public transportation. By considering the traffic congestion in urban areas, the optimal path is calculated to replan routes based on the k shortest path algorithm, and a load balancing technique is adopted to avoid further congestion.