Identifying critical and vulnerable links: A new approach using the Fisher information matrix

In traffic networks, some elements are more prone to suffer or to create disruptive situations, and the identification of these elements becomes a challenge due to the large number of possible threats. The following paper presents two new methodologies to identify and rank vulnerable and critical links of traffic networks. These methodologies use the Fisher Information Matrix, and the analysis of eigenvalues and eigenvectors, to systematically rank the links of a network. The identification is done by using traffic variables, such as the demand, the travel time, and the network's flow. For the ranking of the links, disruptions are considered in all the possible locations of the network, and the effects are systematically evaluated. In addition, the evaluation of traffic resilience is included in the process to validate the results. Finally, both methodologies are tested in a real network to infer on the validity of the results.