Traffic flow rates

1. A system for determining a flow rate of traffic for a road segment, comprising:

a traffic modeling component, implemented via a processor, configured to:

determine probe flow rate information based upon locational information from one or more probe vehicles on a road segment;

obtain satellite imagery of the road segment;

analyze the satellite imagery to identify a count of vehicles on the road segment for a unit of time; and

scale the probe flow rate information based upon the count of vehicles for the unit of time to determine a flow rate.

2. The system of claim 1 , the traffic modeling component configured to:

identify a linear feature for identifying the road segment within the satellite imagery.

3. The system of claim 1 , the traffic modeling component configured to:

overlay a road network onto the satellite imagery for identifying the road segment within the satellite imagery.

4. The system of claim 1 , the traffic modeling component configured to:

identify a parallelogram for identifying a vehicle within the satellite imagery.

5. The system of claim 1 , the traffic modeling component configured to:

determine a ground flow rate based upon the count of vehicles; and

determine the flow rate based upon the probe flow rate information and the ground flow rate.

6. The system of claim 1 , the traffic modeling component configured to:

determine the flow rate for a second unit of time, different than the unit of time, in real-time based upon the probe flow rate information corresponding to real-time locational information of the one or more probe vehicles.

7. The system of claim 1 , the traffic modeling component configured to:

obtain real-time locational information from a set of probe vehicles traveling along the road segment; and

determine a real-time flow rate for the road segment based upon the real-time locational information.

8. The system of claim 1 , the locational information corresponding to a timestamp and global positioning system (GPS) coordinates of at least one of a vehicle head unit, a vehicle computing device, or a mobile device located within a vehicle.

9. The system of claim 1 , the traffic modeling component configured to:

estimate scale factor and offset information based upon the probe flow rate information and the count of vehicles for the unit of time; and

average the scale factor and offset information based upon at least one of a road type, a day of week, a number of lanes per road, a season, road construction, or a weather condition.

10. The system of claim 1 , the traffic modeling component configured to:

utilize vehicle speed information and the probe flow rate information to determine a traffic density.

11. The system of claim 1 , the flow rate corresponding to inferred traffic volume along the road segment.

12. The system of claim 1 , the traffic modeling component configured to:

utilize an image analysis algorithm to identify the count of vehicles from the satellite imagery.

13. The system of claim 12 , the traffic modeling component configured to:

utilize the locational information to identify one or more identified probe vehicles on the road segment; and

adjust the image analysis algorithm based upon the one or more identified probe vehicles.

14. The system of claim 13 , the traffic modeling component configured to:

adjust at least one of an edge detection function or a threshold used by the image analysis algorithm based upon the one or more identified probe vehicles.

15. A computer-implemented method for determining a scaled flow rate of traffic for a road segment, comprising:

determining probe flow rate information based upon locational information from one or more probe vehicles on a road segment;

obtaining imagery of the road segment;

analyzing the imagery to identify a count of vehicles on the road segment for a unit of time;

estimating scale factor and offset information based upon the probe flow rate information and the count of vehicles for the unit of time; and

scaling, via a processor, the probe flow rate information based upon the scale factor and offset information to determine a scaled flow rate.

16. The computer-implemented method of claim 15 , comprising:

obtaining real-time locational information from a set of probe vehicles traveling along the road segment; and

applying the scale factor and offset information to the real-time locational information to determine a real-time flow rate for the road segment.

17. The computer-implemented method of claim 15 , comprising:

utilizing an image analysis algorithm to identify the count of vehicles from the imagery;

utilizing the locational information to identify one or more identified probe vehicles on the road segment; and

adjusting the image analysis algorithm based upon the one or more identified probe vehicles.

18. The computer-implemented method of claim 15 , the imagery comprising an image.

19. The computer-implemented method of claim 15 , the imagery comprising a video.

20. A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising instructions which when executed perform a method for determining a scaled flow rate of traffic for a road segment, comprising:

determining flow rate information associated with a road segment;

obtaining satellite imagery of a road segment;

analyzing the satellite imagery to identify a count of vehicles on the road segment for a unit of time;

estimating scale factor and offset information based upon the flow rate information and the count of vehicles for the unit of time; and

scaling, via a processor, the flow rate information based upon the scale factor and offset information to determine a scaled flow rate.