Automated Vehicle Control

In this chapter we outlined a design for a longitudinal and a lateral controller and discussed communication technologies and sensor requirements for automated vehicles. We highlighted benefits in safety that may be expected due to use of automation. We presented how the presence of lateral sensors and automated lane changing in fully automated vehicles has the potential to improve safety on freeways. We observed that automated vehicles among manual ones in mixed traffic behave like a filter and smooth the traffic flow characteristics when following fast accelerating manual vehicles, without changing the total travel time. This smoothing out of the traffic flow is expected to have a beneficial environmental impact and decrease fuel consumption.