Waterway Simulation

This page describes simulations of (inland) waterways in SUMO.

Caution

The simulation of waterways is a developing subject and still carries some difficulties. These are discussed below.

Approaches to ship modelling

Currently, no exclusive movement model for ships is implemented. Instead the existing models for vehicle movement need to be re-purposed. By setting guiShape="ship", vehicles are drawn in a more appropriate shape.

Building a network for waterway simulation

Waterways can be imported from OSM by adding the type map osmNetconvertShips.typ.xml. They can also be explicitly specified by setting allow="ship".

Overtaking

To allow overtaking, it is recommended to build a network that enables opposite direction driving.

If a linear body of water is wide enough to accomodate more than two ships, it can either be modelled by

• defining multiple lanes per direction
• defining a single wide lane per direction and enabling the sublane model

Known Problems

• Since the right-of-way rules for ships are more complex than those for road vehicles, waterway intersections are set to uncontrolled by default.
• Reversing direction of ships is currently not modelled
• All movements must be modelled by edges. Freely navigating a large body of water is not possible (unless TraCI is used).