Radar intersection – sensors and Car2X modules for connected driving
The goal of our daily activities is to increase road traffic safety. So-called Car2x functions unleash a great deal of additional potential for driver assistance systems and all traffic participants. Some of this potential, such as local danger warning, can already be found in series production today, such as in the new Golf and the ID.3.
According to our estimations, corresponding technologies will also play a vital role in safely bringing autonomous driving to the streets. For years we have been developing Car2X functions for Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles and bringing them into series production, such as 802.11p WiFi communication between vehicles or connected ACC on the MAB and MEB platforms respectively. A wide range of functions will be added in the coming years, particularly those that benefit the protection of vulnerable traffic participants.
In this regard, we have demonstrated the potential of connected driving in a joint project with Volkswagen PKW, Nordsys and smartmicro through a proof-of-concept, in which we equipped an intersection with radar sensors and Car2X communication modules. The sensors and Car2X modules are permanently installed in the intersection zone and recognize all traffic participants in or near the surrounding area.
Information about detected objects is transmitted to connected vehicles in the area with the help of Car2X technology. In this case so-called cooperative perception messages (CPM), which are specified in the IEEE 802.11p WiFi standard, are utilized. Vehicles that receive this information process the object type (pedestrian, cyclist), the current position and the respective direction vector. This information is then compared with the position, speed and driving direction of the ego vehicle to predict a danger situation and to decide if the driver should receive an audio-visual warning, which is done by predicting the movement of foreign objects and the ego vehicle. As soon as the so-called time-to-collision falls below a specific value, a warning appears in the instrument cluster. VAIVA (former: ASTech) built the vehicle and developed the software for this project.