Hajj Traffic Lessening: Smart Transportation System Using Smart Contracts and IoT Based on Blockchain
This thesis proposes and evaluates the Ritual Time Window Smart Contract (RTWSC) framework, an integrated intelligent transportation system combining blockchain-based smart contracts, IoT data, and electric vehicle ride-sharing to significantly reduce traffic congestion, emissions, and waiting times while improving allocation fairness for Hajj pilgrims.
Original paper licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). This is an AI-generated explanation of the paper below. It is not written or endorsed by the authors. For technical accuracy, refer to the original paper. Read full disclaimer
Every year, millions of people gather in a small area of Saudi Arabia to perform the Hajj, one of the largest and most significant religious events on Earth. For a few days, the landscape transforms into a massive, moving city where pilgrims must travel between specific holy sites within strict time limits dictated by religious tradition. This creates a unique and intense logistical challenge: moving two to three million people across a limited road network without causing gridlock, while also managing the heavy pollution caused by thousands of buses and cars idling in the heat. The goal for researchers has long been to find a way to make this movement smoother, faster, and cleaner, but the sheer scale and the need for absolute trust among competing transport companies and government regulators have made it difficult to solve.
To address this, a team of researchers has proposed a new system that combines three modern technologies to manage the flow of pilgrims. The first is the Internet of Things, which simply means giving vehicles and sensors the ability to talk to each other and share their location and status in real time. The second is blockchain, a digital ledger that acts like a public, unchangeable record book where everyone can see what happened, but no single person can secretly alter the entries. The third is smart contracts, which are computer programs that automatically carry out agreements—like paying a driver or assigning a seat—once specific conditions are met, without needing a human manager to approve every step. By weaving these tools together with a fleet of electric vehicles, the researchers aimed to create a transportation network that is not only efficient but also fair and transparent.
The researchers built a detailed computer simulation to test their idea, creating a virtual version of the Hajj pilgrimage with two million pilgrims and fifty thousand vehicles. They compared their new system against the current way things are done, which relies on manual coordination and conventional fuel-powered buses. In their virtual world, the new system worked by first defining "ritual time windows," which are the specific, unchangeable periods when pilgrims must be at certain locations. The system uses sensors on the vehicles to track exactly where they are and how many people are inside. This data is sent to a central digital ledger where a computer program automatically matches pilgrims to available seats, prioritizing those with medical needs or those who are running late, and then directs electric vehicles to pick them up. If a driver fails to show up or a trip is cancelled, the system instantly refunds the passenger's money without anyone needing to file a claim.
The results of the simulation were striking. When the researchers ran the scenario three hundred and sixty times to ensure the results were consistent, they found that the new system reduced the average time a pilgrim had to wait for a ride by more than seventy percent. The traffic congestion on the main roads was cut in half, and the vehicles spent significantly less time sitting idle. Because the system encouraged carpooling and switched the majority of the fleet to electric vehicles, the amount of carbon dioxide released into the air dropped by nearly seventy-one percent. Perhaps most importantly, the system proved to be remarkably fair. In the current system, access to transport can feel uneven, but the new method distributed rides so evenly that the inequality in who got a seat was reduced to a very low level, ensuring that vulnerable pilgrims were served first without anyone having to pay extra to jump the line.
The study also showed that the technology could handle the sheer volume of transactions required for such a massive event. The digital system processed hundreds of requests every second, far exceeding the speed needed to manage the flow of two million people. The researchers noted that while the results were generated in a computer simulation and not on the actual roads of Mecca, the model was rigorous and accounted for the complex, bursty nature of the pilgrimage traffic. They acknowledged that real-world factors, such as how people actually behave in a crowd or the physical limitations of charging electric vehicles in extreme heat, would need to be tested in a real deployment. However, the simulation provided strong evidence that a system built on shared, transparent data and automated rules could solve the twin problems of congestion and pollution that have plagued the Hajj for decades.
Ultimately, this work suggests that the chaotic movement of millions of people can be tamed not by building more roads, but by building a smarter, more honest digital layer on top of the existing infrastructure. By turning the strict religious schedule into a set of automatic rules that everyone agrees to follow, the system removes the need for constant human intervention and the suspicion that often arises when different groups compete for resources. The researchers concluded that this approach offers a blueprint not just for the Hajj, but for any large-scale gathering where people must move together efficiently and safely, proving that technology can serve as a bridge between ancient tradition and modern efficiency.
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