Global Routing Optimization in Road Networks

PhD Thesis Proposal Defence


Title: "Global Routing Optimization in Road Networks"

by

Miss Yehong XU


Abstract:

Route planning is a fundamental service in modern road networks. Existing 
routing systems usually compute routes for individual vehicles based on the 
current or predicted traffic condition. However, when many vehicles are 
guided independently, their routes collectively reshape the traffic condition 
and may create new congestion. This thesis studies global routing optimization 
in road networks, with the goal of improving the overall traffic efficiency by 
considering the mutual influence among routing decisions.

The central idea is to move beyond independent shortest-path computation and 
optimize routing decisions from a system-level perspective. To this end, this 
thesis first formulates the global routing optimization problem and shows that 
route-induced congestion can be reduced by repeatedly evaluating the traffic 
condition caused by current routing decisions and adjusting routes 
accordingly. Building on this foundation, the thesis further investigates 
fine-grained traffic dependency modeling, where the interactions among routes 
are captured at the edge-time level to support more effective query selection 
and congestion-aware rerouting.

Since global routing optimization requires frequent route recomputation under 
changing traffic conditions, this thesis also studies efficient 
time-dependent routing under rolling traffic prediction updates. In particular, 
it develops a sliding-window framework for exact dynamic time-dependent 
shortest-path query processing, which supports efficient index reconstruction, 
extension, and maintenance as the prediction window evolves.

Overall, this thesis aims to build a scalable framework for traffic-aware 
route coordination, combining global routing optimization methods with 
efficient dynamic routing infrastructure.


Date:                   Wednesday, 10 June 2026

Time:                   1:00pm - 3:00pm

Venue:                  Room 5506
                        Lift 25/26

Committee Members:      Prof. Xiaofang Zhou (Supervisor)
                        Prof. Dimitris Papadias (Chairperson)
                        Dr. Xiaomin Ouyang