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Despite the potential effectiveness of the dynamic late merge (DLM) control, most existing DLM systems, based on static thresholds, cannot best perform under time-varying traffic conditions. This paper presents an advanced dynamic merge control, called a lane-based dynamic merge control model and its operational algorithm, which is based on the optimized control thresholds that take into account the interactions among the speed, flow, and available work zone capacity. The focus of this study is on how to select the control variables and to determine their optimal thresholds in response to traffic flow dynamics. Evaluation results with extensive simulation experiments have shown the promising properties of the proposed dynamic merge control and its operational algorithm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper gives conditions which guarantee the existence of an equilibrium arrival pattern at a single bottleneck. In the model, the times at which a driver wishes to leave the bottleneck depend on the driver. The equilibrium queue length in this model always has a continuous time derivative everywhere. However, the slope of the equilibrium cumulative arrival distribution is discontinuous at the beginning and end of congestion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]