Traffic Manager Development for a Roundabout Crossed by Autonomous and Connected Vehicles Using V2I Architecture

Abstract

Connected Autonomous Vehicle (CAV) is considered as a proposal toward sustainable mobility. In order to succeed in a sustainable mobility solution, “CAV” or more precisely “CAV Transport System” should prove to be low energy, safe, and allow better performances than human-driven vehicles. This paper will propose a system architecture for a sustainable CAV Transport System on a standard scenario: crossing a roundabout. Nowadays, roundabouts are very common and practical crossing alternatives to improve the traffic flow and increase safety. This study aims to simulate and analyze the behavior of connected autonomous vehicles crossing a roundabout using a V2I (vehicle-to-infrastructure) architecture. The vehicles are exchanging information with a so-called central signaling unit. All vehicles are exchanging their position, speed, and target destination. The central signaling unit has a global view of the system compared to each ego vehicle (has more local than global information); thus, can safely and efficiently manage the traffic of the vehicles in the roundabout using a standard signaling block strategy. This strategy of decision of the central signaling unit (CSU) is performed by dividing the roundabout into several zones/blocks which can be booked by only one vehicle at a time. A solver, reproducing a vehicle’s behavior and dynamics, computes the trajectory and velocity of each vehicle depending on its surroundings. Finally, a graphical representation is used and implemented to facilitate the analysis and visualization of the roundabout crossing. The vehicle flow performance of the developed traffic control model is compared with SUMO.