Regular-hexagon-equilateral-triangle area grouping–based broadcast protocol for safety message in urban vehicular ad hoc networks

Road-based directional broadcast protocols are proposed in the literatures to offset efficiency of message dissemination of traditional broadcast protocol in urban vehicular ad hoc networks. However, these protocols cannot provide enough reliability and efficiency for vehicles’ misclassification at intersection or on straight road. Therefore, we present regular-hexagon-equilateral-triangle area grouping–based broadcast protocol for urban vehicular ad hoc networks. The area covered by relay node is averagely divided using regular-hexagon-equilateral-triangle, and vehicles are grouped according to the area that they reside. The algorithm for constructing regular-hexagon-equilateral-triangle is proposed. We adopt same vehicles’ grouping method at intersection and on straight road, and no neighbor list is maintained to identify road intersection. We design waiting time formula to calculate time for node forwarding message. It is ruled that node with waiting time dropping to zero first is defined as the relay node, and this relay node transmits message. So there is only one relay node which forwards message in each group. It also rules in regular-hexagon-equilateral-triangle area grouping–based broadcast protocol that each relay node forwards the same message only once, therefore, it limits redundant message retransmission. Using the vehicles’ grouping method and selection strategy of relay node as mentioned above, the proposed protocol enables message to be transmitted in different directions along different roads at the same time. Simulation indicates that our protocol has a better performance