SDN-based traffic management for vehicular ad-hoc networks (VANETs)

Vehicular Ad-hoc Networks (VANETs) play a critical role in enabling intelligent transportation systems by facilitating real-time communication among vehicles and roadside infrastructure. However, the highly dynamic topology, frequent link failures, and traffic congestion present significant challenges to efficient network management. Software-Defined Networking (SDN) offers a promising solution by introducing centralized control, global network visibility, and dynamic traffic management capabilities. This paper proposes an SDN-based traffic management framework for VANETs that leverages a centralized SDN controller to monitor network conditions, optimize routing decisions, and reduce communication overhead. The proposed architecture enhances packet delivery performance, minimizes end-to-end delay, and improves overall network throughput through adaptive traffic control mechanisms. Simulation-based analysis demonstrates the effectiveness of the proposed approach in managing vehicular traffic under varying network densities. The results indicate that SDN-enabled VANETs can significantly improve network efficiency, scalability, and reliability compared to conventional VANET architectures.

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