Integrating MPLS and SDN for Improved Routing in VANETs: A Comparative Study of AODV and OLSR Protocols

Abstract

Vehicular Ad Hoc Networks (VANETs) enable wireless communication among vehicles and roadside infrastructure, supporting safety, traffic optimization and infotainment in Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS). However, the high mobility of vehicles causes frequent topology changes and link breaks, degrading routing performance. This paper investigates the integration of Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) and Software-Defined Networking (SDN) with two widely used VANET routing protocols, Ad hoc On-Demand Distance Vector (AODV) and Optimized Link State Routing (OLSR). We evaluate four progressive configurations for each protocol: the default protocol, the protocol with MPLS-enhanced forwarding, the protocol with SDN-based centralized route optimization, and the combined SDN-MPLS integration. The simulation environment uses a realistic urban topology with 50 vehicles and 5 Road-Side Units (RSUs). Results are analysed while using several traffic patterns and measuring Key Performance Indicators, such as: Packet Delivery Ratio (PDR), average end-to-end delay, jitter, throughput, and routing overhead. The simulations show that each integration layer contributes measurable improvements to the protocol performance, with the SDN-MPLS combination achieving the best overall results.