Traffic flow inference based on link loads and gravity measures

Traffic flow between each pair of nodes in a network may be modeled based on loads measured at each link and based on gravity measures associated with each node. Gravity measures correspond to a relative likelihood of the node being a source or a sink of traffic. Gravity objectives are assigned to nodes to serve as an objective for a node's performance. These gravity objectives may be based on qualitative characteristics associated with each node. Because the assigned gravity objectives may be subjective, the gravity measures are used to generate a quantitative function for determining whether a network can achieve these gravity objectives. In one embodiment, link loads are allocated to traffic flows between nodes and current gravity measures are determined. Changes to link loads and traffic flows may then be modeled to minimize a difference between the assigned gravity measures and the gravity measures.