California Researchers Examine Automated Truck Operations and Deployment
IVsource.net
6 May 2002

As part of the ongoing work in heavy truck automation being funded by the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans), researchers at San Jose State University have been examining deployment paths for inter-city trucking operations.  A detailed deployment sequence has been proposed.

As part of the ongoing work in heavy truck automation being funded by the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans), researchers at San Jose State University (SJSU) have been examining deployment paths for inter-city trucking operations.  This activity augments extensive technical development at the University of California – Berkeley in implementing full function automated trucks.

SJSU professors Jacob Tsao (Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering) and Jan Botha (Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering) have completed the first phase of a study of operating concepts and deployment for an automated trucking system in California.  Both trucking operations and traffic operations were addressed in the study – for example, the researchers explored how trucks might interact with other traffic in merging and de-merging from truck-exclusive lanes.

The centerpiece of their work thus far is a fairly thorough eight-step deployment sequence, which begins with present-day safety warning technologies and evolves to platoons of  heavy trucks, in which a driver is needed only in the lead vehicle -- the following vehicles are unmanned.

Tsao and Botha’s work was presented at the 2002 meeting of the Transportation Research Board in Washington, DC in January, in a paper entitled “An Automated Highway System Dedicated to Inter-City Trucking:  Operating Concepts and Deployment.”

The deployment sequence proposed by the researchers is seen as a “starter” version which will be refined in future work, with the help of feedback from trucking industry stakeholders.  They emphasize that the sequence was conceived to have initial steps that could be beneficial by themselves and would also lead to the implementation of the end state.

The sequence proposed by Tsao and Botha is as follows.  They note that the Market Acceptance Steps, i.e., Steps 1 and 2, are independent of the Public Acceptance Steps, i.e., Steps 3 and 4, and, therefore, these two groups of steps can proceed in parallel.

Step 1: Market Acceptance of Advanced Warning Technologies for Trucks

Step 1.1: Develop and deploy radar-based, infrared based or other range-sensors and frontal crash warning systems for trucks to use on conventional highway lanes as well as off highways.

Step 1.2: Develop and deploy vision-based lane identification and lane-departure warning systems for trucks to use on conventional highway lanes as well as off highways.

Step2: Market Acceptance of (Non-Simultaneous Use of) Hands-off and Feet-off

Automation Technologies for Trucks

Step 2.1: Based on the systems developed and deployed in Step 1.1, develop and deploy vehicle-following and other longitudinal vehicle-control systems that enable feet-off driving. (This includes automatic transmission because manual transmission requires operation of clutch by a foot.)

Step 2.2: Based on the vision-based lane identification and lane-departure warning systems developed and deployed in Step 1.2, develop and deploy lane-keeping and other lateral vehicle control systems that enable hands-off driving.

Disallow the simultaneous use of both the hands-off and the feet-off features, to prevent driver disengagement from driving tasks.  

Step 3: Public Acceptance of Truck-Lane Dedication:

Select an important and congested freight corridor where the benefits of automation will be evident.  It will be important to ascertain that the dedication of a lane will be physically plausible.

Construct a new truck lane or dedicate an existing lane for each direction for exclusive truck use in or next to the median of the main freeway along the corridor.

Step 4: Public Acceptance of a Physically Separated Truck Lane on Freeway Median with Long Combination Vehicles (LCVs) Allowed Through New Legislation:

Separate physically, for each direction, the lane in the median or the lane closest to the median from the rest of the freeway and dedicate that lane as the exclusive truck lane.  A shoulder should be provided to accommodate disabled trucks.

Construct “staging areas” at selected locations off but adjacent to the selected freeway, and build access and egress ramps from and to these “staging areas”.

Allow LCVs on the truck lane (and only on the truck lane and the staging areas, and nowhere else). Such LCVs are not currently allowed in the state of California, but the researchers propose that they be allowed on dedicated and physically separated truck lanes.

Allow entry into and exit from the truck lane (by singles but not doubles or triples) directly from and to the leftmost conventional lane, i.e., the conventional lane that is closest to the truck lane, at locations where the amount of traffic does not warrant a staging area plus a dedicated set of ramps and where such entry and exit can be made safely.

Tolls can be collected electronically either at the interface areas, i.e., the on- or offramps, or at selected locations along the freeway.

Step 5: Automated Driving in Mixed Traffic on the Truck Lane:

Install magnetic markers or other “active” markers on the truck lane to provide those equipped trucks (i.e., those equipped with the corresponding marker detectors) with an additional guidance function; initially for redundancy (to complement onboard lane following technology) and eventually for enabling closely-spaced truck convoying.  Note that closely-spaced truck convoying may render vision-based lane-keeping inoperable, particularly at night.

Support automated driving (i.e., hands-off and feet-off driving) in midst of manually driven traffic, but under the supervision of the truck driver.

All trucks must be equipped with (a) vehicle-to-vehicle communication capability in such a way that the both automated and manually driven trucks can know and anticipate the intent of the trucks in front or in back and (b) vehicle-to-infrastructure communication in such a way that, together with the vehicle-to-vehicle communication, the traffic entering the truck lane through an on-ramp can merge into the mainline traffic safely.  (Note that provision of one single truck lane is assumed.  Adjacent trucks may be either in front or in rear.)

Step 6: Automated Truck Lane Accessible Only From Staging Areas:

Dedicate the truck lane to automated traffic only; disallow non-equipped trucks on the truck lane.

Reduce lane width; use the width no longer needed, possibly together with the existing shoulder or previously unused right-of-way in the median, to build a shoulder that is wide enough so that the single lane plus the shoulder will be able to accommodate one disabled truck on the shoulder and one lane of through traffic at a speed that may be higher than the condition without automation.

Close the on- and off- ramps between the truck lane and the leftmost conventional lane.

In addition to automated driving (i.e., hands-off and feet-off driving), truck-to-truck communication ensures safety and enhances ride quality on the mainline, and truck-to-infrastructure communication, together with the vehicle-to-vehicle communication, enable efficient merging (in addition to safe merging, which is achieved in the previous step).

The driver is responsible for detecting and responding to debris ahead on the lane or other non-nominal events that cannot be reliably or cost-effectively detected by and responded with automation.

“Fitness” checking, if necessary, can be performed in the staging area before a truck moves toward the dedicated on-ramp leading from the staging area directly into the truck lane or at least before a truck reaches the on-ramp.  (The fitness-checking facility can be installed at locations away from the actual on-ramp; this can prevent blocking of the on-ramp and can avoid the need for a “turn-off” lane from the on-ramp back to the staging area, for those trucks failing the fitness check to return to the staging area.)

Step 7: Automated Convoying With no Driver on Trailing Trucks of a Convoy:

Support automated convoying, with no drivers required on any trailing truck (i.e., the tractor plus the trailers) of the convoy.

Step 8: Closely-spaced Convoying:

Support closely-spaced truck convoying for those trucks that are adequately equipped, to achieve fuel savings.

 

Based on industry observations, IVsource notes that Step 1 (advanced warning technologies) and Step 2.1 (feet-off driving, i.e. Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC)) are now on the market in the US and these systems are reported to be selling well.  Trucking firms are realizing safety improvements and fuel savings, and drivers are appreciative of the reduced driving stress resulting from ACC operation.

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For More Information ...

... contact Dr. Tsao at jtsao@email.sjsu.edu or Dr. Botha at jbotha@email.sjsu.edu, or access www.engr.sjsu.edu/jtsao. 

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