IDENTIFYING A STOPPING PLACE FOR AN AUTONOMOUS VEHICLE

• US 20180113456A1
• Filed: 10/20/2016
• Published: 04/26/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 10/20/2016
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Motional AD, LLC (Aptiv PLC)
• Original Assignee: nuTonomy, Inc. (Aptiv PLC)
• Inventors: Iagnemma, Karl, Ravichandran, Harshavardhan
• Granted Patent: US 10,681,513 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 20/586 of parking space
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/0112 from the vehicle, e.g. floating car data [FCD]
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/0133 for classifying traffic situation
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/0145 for active traffic flow control
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/096811 where the route is computed offboard
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/70 Services for machine-to-machine communication [M2M] or machine type communication [MTC]

Abstract

Among other things, stored data is maintained indicative of potential stopping places that are currently feasible stopping places for a vehicle within a region. The potential stopping places are identified as part of static map data for the region. Current signals are received from sensors or one or more other sources current signals representing perceptions of actual conditions at one or more of the potential stopping places. The stored data is updated based on changes in the perceptions of actual conditions. The updated stored data is exposed to a process that selects a stopping place for the vehicle from among the currently feasible stopping places.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method comprising

maintaining stored data indicative of potential stopping places that are currently feasible stopping places for a vehicle within a region, the potential stopping places being identified as part of static map data for the region,

receiving from sensors or one or more other sources current signals representing perceptions of actual conditions at one or more of the potential stopping places,

updating the stored data based on changes in the perceptions of actual conditions, and

exposing the updated stored data to a process that selects a stopping place for the vehicle from among the currently feasible stopping places.

2. The method of claim 1 comprising

initializing the potential stopping places as all of the potential stopping places identified as part of the static map data for the region.

3. The method of claim 1 comprising

discretizing the potential stopping places as a finite number of points within the region corresponding to potential stopping places.

4. The method of claim 3 comprising

defining a potential stopping place as a shape containing one of the points, the shape corresponding to a footprint of the vehicle.

5. The method of claim 4 comprising

attributing an orientation to the shape, the orientation corresponding to a direction of traffic flow.

6. The method of claim 3 comprising

initializing the potential stopping places as potential stopping places expected to be feasible based on prior signals from sensors representing perceptions of actual conditions at one or more of the potential stopping places.

7. The method of claim 1 in which the sensors comprise sensors located on the vehicle.

8. The method of claim 1 in which the sensors comprise sensors located other than on the vehicle.

9. The method of claim 1 comprising including in the updated stored data information about how recently the updating occurred, or the reason for the indication that a potential stopping place is feasible or not feasible.

10. The method of claim 1 in which the current signals received from sensors are received through V2V or V2I communication.

11. The method of claim 1 in which the one or more other sources comprise crowd-sourced data sources.

12. The method of claim 1 in which the vehicle is part of a fleet of vehicles managed from a central server and the method comprises the server distributing information received from sensors at one of the vehicles to other vehicles of the fleet.