Time-to-contact statistics as a proxy for accident probabilities

Accidents are relatively rare, and this makes it difficult to study the impact of traffic system changes or vehicle control changes on accident rates. One potential solution to this problem is the use of time-to-contact (TTC) statistics as a proxy for accident probabilities. Low TTC can be used as a measure of potential danger. Simulations were performed to explore whether inverse TTC can serve as a good proxy of accident probability. The resulting data was then analyzed to investigate how inverse TTC varies with the mixture of vehicles with bilateral control as opposed to car-following control. Previously, it was found that a relatively high mixture ratio is needed to prevent phantom traffic jams. The results in this paper show that there is a benefit to mixing bilateral control cars into general traffic, even at relatively low mixture ratios. Simulations were also performed to see how acceleration and jerk vary with the mixture of vehicles with bilateral control so that passenger comfort could be quantified. The results show that bilateral control improves passenger comfort.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2019

Author dc:creator

• Haulcy, R'mani(R'mani Symon)

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Berthold K.P. Horn.

• Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.

Statement dc:rights

• MIT theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed, downloaded, or printed from this source but further reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/122699

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/122699