Combining Vehicle Dynamics Control and Decision Making Procedures Towards Safe Overtaking Maneuvers

Overtaking vehicles are among the most difficult driving maneuvers. In particular, young or inexperienced drivers often misjudge the current traffic situation when planning to pass a vehicle ahead. In most cases however, false situation estimations lead to dangerous traffic scenarios. For instance, in Germany about 18000 accidents occur due to misjudged overtaking maneuvers per year.

The planning process for overtaking a vehicle requires to gather, weight and estimate different information pieces, like vehicle speed of oncoming traffic, road track ahead, velocity of the vehicle to be passed, etc. Besides sensing information, such a planning process demands a considerable amount of experience, particularly when estimating certain information that cannot be measured or sensed by the driver. Decision making and supporting means that assist the driver during that planning process therefore can lead to a safer overtaking maneuver or can warn the driver if there is no way to pass the vehicle ahead without getting in dangerous traffic situation.