POLARIS (Planning and Operations Language for Agent-based Regional Integrated Simulation) is an advanced traffic simulation platform developed by the Argonne National Laboratory, designed to model urban transportation systems at a regional scale. Unlike traditional models based on aggregated flows, POLARIS uses an agent-based approach, individually representing vehicles and users of the road network.

The tool allows for simulation with high temporal and spatial resolution of dynamic traffic behavior, including route decisions, responses to congestion conditions, stops at traffic signals, delays, and interactions between different transportation modes. Furthermore, it can be integrated with real mobility data, urban sensors, and public policies, making it ideal for transportation planning and operations studies.

POLARIS produces output files containing detailed vehicle trajectories, speeds, travel times, and other operational parameters, which can be used for efficiency analyses, vehicle emissions (when integrated with Autonomie), and environmental impact assessments.