  We study a minimal model of traffic flows in complex networks, simple enough
to get analytical results, but with a very rich phenomenology, presenting
continuous, discontinuous as well as hybrid phase transitions between a
free-flow phase and a congested phase, critical points and different scaling
behaviors in the system size. It consists of random walkers on a queueing
network with one-range repulsion, where particles can be destroyed only if they
can move. We focus on the dependence on the topology as well as on the level of
traffic control. We are able to obtain transition curves and phase diagrams at
analytical level for the ensemble of uncorrelated networks and numerically for
single instances. We find that traffic control improves global performance,
enlarging the free-flow region in parameter space only in heterogeneous
networks. Traffic control introduces non-linear effects and, beyond a critical
strength, may trigger the appearance of a congested phase in a discontinuous
manner. The model also reproduces the cross-over in the scaling of traffic
fluctuations empirically observed in the Internet, and moreover, a conserved
version can reproduce qualitatively some stylized facts of traffic in
transportation networks.
