The state-of-the-art in the application of artificial intelligence-based models for traffic noise prediction: a bibliographic overview

This paper reviews the application of artificial intelligence (AI)-based models in modeling vehicular road traffic noise. A computerized search method was used to conduct the literature search. Fifty published articles from 2007 to 2023 were reviewed regarding observation time, input data, countries where studies were performed, and modeling techniques. Sixty-three percent of the studies used an observation period of 60 min, and 29% used 15 min. All the reviewed papers considered traffic flow as the major input parameter, followed by average speed, with 95% of the researchers using it as an input parameter. It was found that using AI-based models for traffic noise prediction was popular in countries with no established empirical models. The primary input parameters for the AI-based models are traffic volume and speed. Traffic volume is used either as total traffic volume or classified into sub-categories, and each category is used as an independent input parameter. Although AI-based models have demonstrated reliable performance regarding prediction error and goodness of fit, the accuracy of the AI-based models’ performance should be compared with the results of the empirical models in countries with established models, such as the UK (CoRTN) and the USA (FHWA).