AHSRA
Research
Materials

International Standardization Activities

Systems for Practical Application

Advanced Cruise-Assist Highway System (AHS) Technology: Element Technologies Development and Functional Improvement and Verification

Report on Attendance at IV'2002

Report on Tour of Japan-US Snowplow Support System
 
Yasuya Kajiwara, D.Eng.
Manager Advanced Cruise-Assist Highway System Research Association
 
1. The Necessity for International Standardization Activities

The idea of standardization is to assure mutual operability, interconnectivity, and compatibility. This stimulates market development and benefits the user with added convenience. ITS uses information and telecommunications technology to link together person, road, and vehicle with the goal of resolving a various problems in road traffic. Standardization is necessary for effective construction and operation of this kind of social systems.
Global competition and cooperation are vital in ITS as well as in other fields, and participants are pressing for standardization activities as a market strategy. Public services on roads and telecommunications platforms, however, are not constructed only to revitalize industry. They are also important as the infrastructure that allows citizen to live in safety and comfort, and international standardization activities should be facilitated from this perspective, as well.
 
2. Organization of AHS International Standardization Activities

The international standardization organizations include the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC). Standards in the electrical and electronic fields are handled by the IEC, and other fields are handled by ISO, while the new field of information technology has been assigned to the ISO/IEC Joint Technical Committee 1 (JTC 1). Standards in the field of telecommunications come under the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), a specialized agency of the United Nations, which issues technical standards in the form of ITU Recommendations.
Work on ITS standardization is carried on in ISO by TC 204, the Technical Committee on Intelligent Transport Systems. TC 204 initially had sixteen Working Groups (WG), of which twelve are currently active.
The working group most closely involved with systems for the seven safety services under development by AHSRA is WG 14 for Vehicle/Roadway Warning and Control Systems. The organization in Japan that handles international meetings of WG14 is the Vehicle/Road Warning and Control Systems Group, which is operating under the Technical Committee of the ITS Standardization Committee.
 

3. Activities of ISO/TC 204 WG 14

WG 14 of ISO/TC 204 has engaged in standardization of the following six systems:

(a) Traffic Impediment Warning System
This system detects accidents and other emergent situations on blind curves or other locations, and displays warnings about the obstacle on information boards placed before that location. This is an infrastructure system that has been registered in an ISO Technical Paper.
(b) Adaptive Cruise Control System
This is an on-board cruise control system that uses a forwaid clearance detector to measure the distance to the vehicle ahead in order to maintain the cleasance set by the driver. This item is now at the final stage of standardization.
(c) Forward Vehicle Collision Warning System
This is an on-board system that uses a forwand clearance detector to measure the distance to the vehicle ahead and the relative speed, and issues a warning to avoid a collision. This items is now at the final stage of standardization.
(d) Maneuvering Aid for Low Speed Operation
This is an on-board system that issues a collision warning to obstacles at the rear end when the vehicle is being maneuvered in backing at low speed. A working draft has been completed and is under voting for committee draft (CD).
(e) Lane Departure Warning System
This system recognizes traffic lanes demarcated using white lines or other lane markers and issues a warning when the vehicle is departing from its lane. The type of lane marker has not been prescribed. A working draft is currently being written.
(f) Side Obstacle Warning System
This is an on-board system that detects moving vehicles at the rear or at the side blind spots when the subject vehicle is changing lanes or merging, and issues a warning. A working draft is currently being written.

These systems are related to those being developed at AHSRA as follows:
(1) Parts of the traffic impediment warning system have already reached the point of practical application, and they are expected to be included as part of the initial deployment of support for prevention of collisions with forward obstacles.
(2) The lane departure warning system is identical to the AHS-i system of support for prevention of lane departure. Although there are no standards for the system's infrastructure element, the standard for methods of issuing warnings in the vehicle mode are specified here.
(3) When the adaptive cruise control system acquires road surface information from the infrastructure, it is identical to the AHS system of support for road surface condition information for maintaining headway, etc.
(4) When the forward vehicle collision warning system acquires information on obstacles from the infrastructure, it is identical to the AHS-i system of support for prevention of collisions with forward obstacles.
 
4. History of Standardization Proposals Activities Presented to ISO/TC 204 WG 14

As described above in connection with ISO/TC 204 WG 14 activities, the systems that are currently undergoing the standardization procedure become more or less identical to the systems being developed by AHSRA when those WG 14 systems are augmented with information received from infrastructure.
Certain elements must be present in standardization proposals for them to succeed. For example, they must be designed to incorporate as much information provided by the infrastructure as possible so that they can be applied to the systems under development by AHSRA. In addition, the systems must be achievable in the near term, use mature technologies, and be considered interesting in many other countries.
Japan took this approach in proposing a system for improving convenience and safety that is based on adaptive cruise control (ACC), which is in the final stage of standardization. ACC was combined with low speed following (LSF) system, which adds car-following functionality for congested and low-speed driving. This combination was further augmented by providing it with outside information received from the infrastructure. The proposal for this system was presented at the international WG 14 meeting at Otsu in the spring of 2000, under the name of the Speed Adaptation System. The European and American members considered the system premature, and it was held for continuing study. At the international WG 14 meeting in Milano in the autumn of that year, however, the content of the proposal was fleshed out in greater detail and the name was changed to Enhanced Cruise Support System. Support for the new proposal was obtained from five countries, but it was again held over for continuing study. At the Anaheim international meeting in the spring of 2001, however, seven countries agreed that the proposal should be submitted to the Sydney congress in 2001. In the meantime, Japan has been assigned to draft the infrastructure information aspect and Germany the LSF aspect, and the overall proposal is to be coordinated and organized by Japan. The system was assigned the name Enhanced Adaptive Cruise Control System (EACC), and its layout is shown in Fig. 1.
 
Fig. 1. General Concept for Enhanced Adaptive Cruise Control (EACC)
 
5. Issues and Plans for the Future

Given the current status of related systems being placed on the market, the standardization activities conducted in WG 14 up to this time have mainly been concerned with systems for longitudinal control of vehicles. There is also the fact that the development and deployment of infrastructure systems have not been conducted in an internationally transparent manner. Consequently, on-board vehicle systems have taken precedence. It has become clear, however, that future development will take the direction of vehicle lateral control and crossing control, and it will also move from independent on-board systems toward cooperative vehicle-highway systems. A proposed plan for future standardization is shown in Fig. 2.
 
Fig. 2. Proposed International Standardization Plan
 

In more specific terms, our ideas regarding these systems are as follows:

(1) A draft EACC standard will be created that encompasses all the information used in support for prevention of collisions with forward obstacles, support for prevention of over shooting on curves, and support for road surface condition information for maintaining headway, etc.
(2) We will seek to establish a consensus with other countries regarding the cooperative vehicle-highway systems functionality of the traffic impediment warning system at the review in three years.
(3) We will prepare a proposal of a lane keeping system to serve as the next version of the lane departure warning system.
(4) We will study the standardization of intersection warning system to determine which elements should be implemented first, while also monitoring trends of the development in the United States and other countries.