Hierarchical Hybrid Control Of Automated Highway Systems

The goal of this dissertation is to design controllers that guarantee collision-free operation of vehicles on an Automated Highway System (AHS) using platooning. It begins with an overview of the AHS control system. The individual layers of the hierarchical control architecture for platooning are described, followed by a brief introduction to hybrid systems. This is then followed by a description of the design of a regulation layer feedback controller for the leader of a platoon. The next section contains the design of an interface between this feedback controller and the discrete event coordination layer. The next chapter presents an analysis of the combined hybrid system using a dedicated simulation tool. The simulation analysis indicates certain shortcomings of the design, in particular, crashes. These crashes are documented and analyzed to eliminate their causes. This is followed by a design of entry and exit maneuvers. Concluding remarks and directions for future work are presented in the final chapter.