Automated Driving Risk-Area Planning With Behavior Range Limits
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Solution Overview
Problem
Automated driving vehicles face challenges in formulating safe action plans due to differences in vehicle type and manufacturer, leading to increased processing load when predicting the behavior of other vehicles, especially in high-risk traffic areas with multiple participants.
Innovation Solution
An automated driving vehicle system that includes an external information acquirer, on-board communicator, action plan formulator, and travel controller, which narrows the behavior allowable range by setting acceleration limits, speed limits, and inter-vehicle margins, and prohibits lane changes within high-risk areas, using risk area notifications from a traffic management server.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If the vehicle formulates a safe action plan by allowing a certain latitude in the predicted future behavior of other vehicles to account for differences in vehicle type and manufacturer, then safety is improved, but the processing load on the computer increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent changes the parameter of behavior prediction from unlimited future behavior to behavior within a predetermined time period. This parameter change allows the system to maintain safety by still predicting other vehicles' actions while reducing the computational complexity and processing load by limiting the prediction horizon.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies preliminary action by pre-defining the behavior allowable range based on vehicle type and manufacturer characteristics. This preliminary classification allows the system to quickly identify and predict only relevant behaviors within the allowable range, rather than considering all possible future behaviors, thus reducing processing load while maintaining safety.
2Productivity
If the vehicle narrows the behavior allowable range in high-risk areas, then the processing load is reduced, but the behavior flexibility of the vehicle is limited
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies local quality by making the behavior allowable range location-dependent. In high-risk areas, the allowable range is narrowed to reduce processing load, while in other areas, the full range of behaviors is permitted. This spatial variation in quality allows the system to optimize processing efficiency where needed without unnecessarily limiting behavior flexibility elsewhere.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent makes the behavior allowable range dynamic by adjusting it based on the vehicle's location and risk level. The range is not fixed but adapts in real-time, being narrower in high-risk areas and wider in low-risk areas. This dynamic adjustment allows the system to reduce processing load in critical areas while maintaining behavior flexibility when safety risks are lower.
Data Source
AI summary
An automated driving vehicle 2a, 2b, 2c, 2d includes: an external information acquisition device configured to acquire external information regarding a state of surroundings of the automated driving vehicle as a vehicle of interest; an on-board communication device configured to receive a risk area notification regarding a high-risk area in a target traffic area 9a; an action plan formulation device configured to formulate an action plan for the vehicle of interest such that a behavior of the vehicle of interest is prevented from exceeding a predetermined behavior allowable range; and a travel control device configured to operate a travel actuator based on the action plan to cause the vehicle of interest to automatically travel. In a case where the vehicle of interest is moving within the high-risk area, the action plan formulation device sets the behavior allowable range to a range associated with the risk area notification.