On the V2X speed synchronization at intersections: Rule based System for extended virtual platooning

Autonomous vehicles that are able to communicate together allowed the emergence of a new way of controlling intersections. Recently an active research community stakes on cooperative intersection management. Vehicles and intersection are able to communicate together in order to improve traffic condition at intersections. Many simulations have shown that the cooperative intersection management outperforms traffic lights because there are no limited stages as within traffic light and authorized movements are adapted to the current situation. This paper focusses on speed synchronization at intersections. More precisely, a virtual platoon is formed by vehicles coming from different lanes. When traffic rate is low this allows avoiding useless stops and thus the speed synchronization saves energy and increases the average speed. However, experiments showed that some parameters need to be considered. Hence, as the traffic rate grows, vehicles need to stop and speed synchronization is no more efficient. The main reason of this drawback is that the studied concepts are limited to First Come First Served or to First Out First-Served. This paper extends the virtual platooning, where new rules form new virtual platoon able to adjust dynamically the whole behavior according to the traffic flow growth under safety conditions. Simulations based on real-world experiences show that the proposed approach is very efficient by increasing the average speed while keeping a high capacity of the intersection. (C) 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.