Integrated Driver–Vehicle–Infrastructure Road Departure Warning Unit

In this paper, a road-departure warning unit taking into account driver-vehicle-infrastructure (DVI) interactions is proposed. The longitudinal and lateral vehicle dynamics limits are analyzed to detect the road departure on loss of control. Vehicle positioning and time to lane crossing (TLC) are used to detect the road departure on a defect of guidance. Prevention of excessive longitudinal speed is handled through the computation of a critical longitudinal speed when approaching a curve and speed profile generation in the straight road section preceding the curve. For the lateral mode, the vehicle oversteering or understeering, the yaw motion, and the lateral acceleration are analyzed. The vehicle lateral displacement and the TLC values are also examined when the vehicle dynamics are not excessive. Necessary data for detection algorithms, which are not available from measurements, are estimated using an extended Kalman filter. The system consists of several subsystems, which work in parallel and provide warning through a dedicated human-machine interface (HMI). This road-departure warning system is experimentally tested on a test track using a prototype vehicle. It is found to be efficient and robust.