Syed Shah Sultan Mohiuddin QadriMahmut Ali GokceErdinc OnerGokce, Mahmut AliQadri, Syed Shah Sultan MohiuddinOner, Erdinc2025-10-0620201867-07171866-888710.1186/s12544-020-00439-12-s2.0-85092356796http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12544-020-00439-1https://gcris.yasar.edu.tr/handle/123456789/5740https://doi.org/10.1186/s12544-020-00439-1Introduction Due to the menacing increase in the number of vehicles on a daily basis abating road congestion is becoming a key challenge these years. To cope-up with the prevailing traffic scenarios and to meet the ever-increasing demand for traffic the urban transportation system needs effective solution methodologies. Changes made in the urban infrastructure will take years sometimes may not even be feasible. For this reason traffic signal timing (TST) optimization is one of the fastest and most economical ways to curtail congestion at the intersections and improve traffic flow in the urban network. Purpose Researchers have been working on using a variety of approaches along with the exploitation of technology to improve TST. This article is intended to analyze the recent literature published between January 2015 and January 2020 for the computational intelligence (CI) based simulation approaches and CI-based approaches for optimizing TST and Traffic Signal Control (TSC) systems provide insights research gaps and possible directions for future work for researchers interested in the field. Methods In analyzing the complex dynamic behavior of traffic streams simulation tools have a prominent place. Nowadays microsimulation tools are frequently used in TST related researches. For this reason a critical review of some of the widely used microsimulation packages is provided in this paper. Conclusion Our review also shows that approximately 77% of the papers included utilizes a microsimulation tool in some form. Therefore it seems useful to include a review categorization and comparison of the most commonly used microsimulation tools for future work. We conclude by providing insights into the future of research in these areas.Englishinfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccessTraffic signal timing optimization, Traffic signal control, Urban traffic, Microsimulation, Computational intelligenceGENETIC ALGORITHM, COMPUTATIONAL INTELLIGENCE, USER EQUILIBRIUM, OPTIMIZATION, INTERSECTION, NETWORK, COORDINATION, TIMINGS, LIGHTS, PARAMETERSComputational IntelligenceTraffic Signal ControlUrban TrafficTraffic Signal Timing OptimizationMicrosimulationReview