Road Departure Avoidance System Based on the Driver Decision Estimator

In this paper a robust road departure avoidance system based on a closed-loop driver decision estimator (DDE) is presented. The main idea is that of incorporating the driver intent in the control of the vehicle. The driver decision estimator computes the vehicle look ahead lateral position based on the driver input and uses this position to establish the risk of road departure. To induce a risk of road departure, the proposed system is implemented on a driving simulator and thirty test drivers were asked to avoid a pylon-confined area (obstacle) while keeping the vehicle within the road limits. The RDA systems intervened by applying a haptic-feedback and correcting the steering angle in the event that a vehicle road departure was likely to occur. The experimental results showed that the proposed system reduced workload and effectively helped drivers to stay within road limits.