A Petri net approach of deadlock prevention in marine traffic system

This paper deals with the traffic control of vessels moving through the marine system of canals and basins. Dangerous vessel deadlock situations may occur in case of vessels' irregular moving through the system. To avoid this, the vessel traffic is supervised and controlled by traffic lights. A supervisor is responsible for vessels' stopping only in the case of dangerous situation and until this situation elapses. This paper shows a formal method of calculating a maximal permissible deadlock prevention supervisor by use of Petri net and iterative siphon control method. The functionality of calculated deadlock prevention supervisor is verified using a computer simulation of vessels' movements.