Vehicles that drive themselves along the motorway as part of large convoys are a step closer after the first successful test of the technology.
The SARTRE (Safe Road Trains for the Environment) project, led by engineering consultancy Ricardo UK, showed that a single car equipped with the technology could follow a lead vehicle around the Volvo Proving Ground near Gothenburg, Sweden.
Ricardo UK’s Tom Robinson, SARTRE project coordinator, said it was a major milestone for the programme and represented tangible progress towards the realisation of safe and effective road-train technology.
Vehicle platooning involves a line of multiple vehicles led by a professional driver, where each car measures the distance, speed and direction, adjusting to the car in front. Once in the platoon, drivers can relax and do other things while the platoon proceeds towards its long-haul destination and vehicles can leave the procession at any time.
The technology incorporates a navigation system and a transmitter/receiver unit that communicates with the lead vehicle that drives with full control of all the various functions.
Platooning is claimed to have a number of potential advantages. It can improve road safety, since it eliminates the human factor that is the cause of at least 80 per cent of road accidents. By reducing air resistance it saves fuel consumption and thus CO2 emissions up to 20 per cent. Also, since the vehicles travel at speed with only a few metres gap, platooning may also relieve traffic congestion.
It is the first time SARTRE has tested its systems outside the simulator, achieving distances of around 3km at speeds up to 40kph with an inter-vehicle gap of around 20m.
Robinson revealed that further tests will be carried out throughout 2011, with increasing speed, shorter inter-vehicle distance, more vehicles and more complex platoon strategies.
’These are likely to be carried out at test tracks in Gothenburg and the UK,’ he said. ’In 2012 we will be starting assessment where we are seeking to assess the actual benefits to platoon users, these will be carried out by Idiada [a company] on a test track in Spain and hopefully will include a demonstration of the system operating on a public highway in Spain.’
Other companies in the EU-financed SARTRE collaboration include Idiada and Robotiker-Tecnalia of Spain, Institut fur Kraftfahrwesen Aachen of Germany and SP Technical Research Institute of Sweden.
A nice idea, but cost is likely to be the stumbling point, not to mention the legal issues. On Britains motorways, it’s still likely to be a slow-road-train.
Platooning??? Has no-one actually raised the current effects of HGV vehicles who tend to travel in convoy of 3 or more vehicles? When this happens a three lane motorway with plenty of room for safe driving becomes a two and then a one lane road with speed limits of 70mph. I would suggest that the Platoon of cars will not be travelling at the maximum speed allowed as there will be a problem when peeling off out of the line, so this will mean long lines of vehicles travelling slower than the other non platoon vehicles creating their own bottlenecks. Also how does one break into the Platoon line to exit the motorway at an appropriate junction. I know, “join the Platoon” if you have the correct technology. This could get very awkward before it gets good.
This is truly scary stuff !
The article implies that this platooning will be introduced on our fastest roads, where accidents will be likely to have the most impact.
“Human factor is the cause of at least 80% of road accidents” – what about the up to 20% not caused by a human factor, how many more such accidents are avoided courtesy of the human factor ?
Transfer of control from computer to ‘human driver’ requires the driver to instantly and smoothly pick up the controls, potentially at high speed.
If there is only a gap of a few metres between vehicles and the lead vehicle has to make an emergency stop, what happens when a following vehicle has a weaker braking performance ?
Is manual control disabled whilst ‘platooning’, or is manual over-ride allowed ?
If disabled, then a control glitch (software error, communication error, sensor fault, etc) cannot be manually over-ridden.
If enabled, then the ‘human driver’ is able to take control straight from concentrating on other things, at high speed, only metres from the car in front (and behind).
What if the ‘human driver’ has to take over at short notice, and is busy doing other things ?
If one driver needs to leave the platoon, the following driver may have little time to assume control of their vehicle, so will the computer slow their vehicle behind the turning vehicle, then speed up to the new car in front, or will the computer be allowed to overtake the turning vehicle ?
What if the road-holding performance (or engine power) of the following cars is not as good as the lead car, will they be allowed to break formation to drive more slowly, and what if their ‘human driver’ is not ready to assume control ?
These questions are just the tip of the iceberg. I’m not ready to hand over my motorway safety to a remote software developer.
This must be the brainchild of someone who doesn’t or can’t drive on the motorway. As already mentioned the differing performance of vehicles would make it unworkable and transient conditions such as leaving or joining would create a catastrophic effect.
how many accidents on motorway result from lorry driver working excess hours – and falling asleep. what happens to the following cars when the lead driver falls asleep and loses control.
This is a good idea only if there is a new roadway laid alongside existing motorways. This system has a number of defects in its present from. If trucks or platooning is to happen in the inside lane then you would have massive exit problems at junctions for manual drivers (ever been stuck trying to come into the inside lane when trucks are nose to tail without this tech?), next is road damage ( you would create rails in the roads which are hazardous to other drivers of lighter vehicles, I have seen this in the UAE where only the inside lane is allowed for trucks), what happens if a truck has a blow out?, what are the control systems that allow the immediate manual control of the affected truck and the subsequent ones following and if the there is an automatic breaking system I am sure this will end up showing a shunted train reaction, not nice for the drivers following.
Convoys on the road are bad enough, this would make matters worse unless there is a dedicated truck motorway. We could always send by train and have local delivery services which may help local delivery companies from being priced out eh market by European businesses.
It is a shame that lashings of cold water have been poured over this development, I suspect the same thing happened when it was proposed that cars no longer have to travel with a man with a red flag running in front! I think it is a great idea, given the amount of technology already in modern cars (electric power steering, auto transmission, sat nav, parking sensors) it was bound to happen that it was all linked together to more automate the driving function. Keep up the good work, I would love to have time to read ‘The Engineer’ while driving to work. Simon
The whole idea of individual vehicle travel is one of choice so instead of wasting resources on this better to invest in a ‘platooning’ system already in exitstence – railways as in ten years time the costs of motoring will have escalated to who knows what making long journeys uneconomical
Platooning seems to provide an excellent opportunity for undesirables to exploit insurance claims by accidents they could cause by braking unexpectedly, especially when joining or leaving the platoon. This would need some very sophisticated software to prevent
Lot’s of valid objections have been raised above. I think platooning will be viable when fully automatic driving is possible on the motorway. Many of the underlying technologies are similar but a fully automatic car will be able to make it’s own decisions as to how to enter or leave the platoon, including slowing down to allow other cars to join.
Automatic driving technology has made breakthroughs in the last few years. for a computer, motorway driving is relatively easy (compared to driving through a residential street). The environment is structured, simple and predictable. We humans find it difficult because of speed of observation and reaction – areas where computers are vastly better than us – and still motorways are much safer than other roads.
The car’s computer will keep a safe distance behind the car in front. If the car in front is controlled by an unpredictable human, this distance will be greater than if the car is controlled by a computer.
So the platooning concept described will be bypassed by, and incorporated into, automatic driving on motorways.
Easy. Allow this system only in the “fast” lane, ie to get into the platoon, you would have to be travelling at near the speed limit and would have to warn the next lane accross when wanting to leave the platoon lane. Soling white lines would do the job. Obviously this would not be allowed for trucks, vans, …, as you cannot see past their massive bodies
This would have to be sopecial identical vehicles which link up and run, then separate and allow deceleration to the next lane down’s max speed, leave the train lane and then the following vehicle would accelerate slightly to catch the train again.
We are already limited to a 2 lane motorway network by the 75% of British drivers who are unable to return to the lane they’re supposed to be in. If the powers that be cannot do anything to re-educate our existing arrogance and ignorance of motoring law, how is a platoon ever going to come to our roads?