Comparative Study of Push and Pull Communications in a Rural VANET

Vehicle-to-everything (V2X) communications are expected to become increasingly common on roadways in the near future. This advancement will support the development of safety applications that significantly improve the protection of vulnerable road users (VRUs). Pedestrians are particularly exposed to accidents in rural areas, where dedicated walkways are frequently absent. This work evaluates two distinct communication paradigms - pull and push models - each implemented in both centralized and decentralized architectures, using a safety monitoring system developed for a simulated rural vehicular network. The pull model is implemented using Named Data Networking (NDN) paradigm, which inherently supports a pull-based communication approach where consumers actively request data from providers. In contrast, the push model follows a publish-subscribe scheme, where consumers subscribe previously to specific information and producers proactively deliver data to subscribers. The simulation results show that the push-based model is more efficient than pull-based model in reducing network congestion and packet loss, despite the latter’s enhanced coordination capabilities. In terms of time responsiveness, both communication models performed similarly within the developed VRU safety application.