Temporal Difference-Aware Graph Convolutional Reinforcement Learning for Multi-Intersection Traffic Signal Control

Abstract

Traffic light control plays a crucial role in intelligent transportation systems. This paper introduces Temporal Difference-Aware Graph Convolutional Reinforcement Learning (TeDA-GCRL), a decentralized RL-based method for efficient multi-intersection traffic signal control. Specifically, we put forward a new graph architecture using each lane as a node for considering intersection relations. Additionally, we propose two new rewards by considering temporal information, namely Temporal-Aware Pressure on Incoming Lanes (TAPIL) and Temporal-Aware Action Consistency (TAAC), which enhance learning efficiency and time-interval sensitivity. Experimental results on five datasets show the superiority of TeDA-GCRL over state-of-the-art methods by at least 9.5% in average travel time.