Communications and Driver Monitoring Aids for Fostering SAE Level-4 Road Vehicles Automation

Road vehicles include more and more assistance systems that perform tasks to facilitate driving and make it safer and more efficient. However, the automated vehicles currently on the market do not exceed SAE level 2 and only in some cases reach level 3. Nevertheless, the qualitative and technological leap needed to reach level 4 is significant and numerous uncertainties remain. In this sense, a greater knowledge of the environment is needed for better decision making and the role of the driver changes substantially. This paper proposes the combination of cooperative systems with automated driving to offer a wider range of information to the vehicle than on-board sensors currently provide. This includes the actual deployment of a cooperative corridor on a highway. It also takes into account that in some circumstances or scenarios, pre-set or detected by on-board sensors or previous communications, the vehicle must hand back control to the driver, who may have been performing other tasks completely unrelated to supervising the driving. It is thus necessary to assess the driver's condition as regards retaking control and to provide assistance for a safe transition.