Can Advances in Vehicle-Based Technologies Provide Solutions
to Highway Congestion
Department
of Mechanical Engineering
University of
Minnesota
Minneapolis, MN 55455
Traffic
congestion in the country’s major metropolitan areas continues to grow
every year. Annual increases in
traffic demand continue to outpace increase in highway capacity making it
unlikely that roadway expansion can provide a solution to highway congestion. This talk looks at how advances in
vehicle-based technologies could provide an evolutionary solution to the
problem. Adaptive cruise control
(ACC) systems are being developed by many automotive manufacturers and are
likely to become standard automotive equipment in the future. The first part of this talk describes
how the development of intelligent algorithms on ACC vehicles can lead to an
increase in highway capacity while at the same time ensuring safe highway
travel. Next, the talk describes
how the enhancement of ACC systems with co-operative vehicle-highway
infrastructure can lead to further dramatic increases in highway capacity. The final part of the talk discusses
the development of a new class of narrow vehicles that provide a completely
different approach towards addressing the traffic congestion issue. A prototype narrow vehicle with
automatic tilt control has been developed at the University of Minnesota. Results will be presented from a
research project focused on making this narrow vehicle as safe, comfortable and
easy to drive as a regular passenger sedan.
Friday, October 25,
2002
3:30 – 4:30
p.m.