Unsignalized Intersection Management Strategy for Mixed Autonomy Traffic Streams

With the rapid development of connected and automated vehicles (CAVs) and intelligent transportation infrastructure, CAVs and connected human-driven vehicles (CHVs) will coexist on the roads in the future for a long time. This paper comprehensively considers the different traffic characteristics of CHVs and CAVs, and systemically investigates the unsignalized intersection management strategy from upper decision-making level to lower execution level. Combined with the designed vehicle planning and control algorithm, the unsignalized intersection management strategy consists of two parts: the heuristic priority queues based right of way allocation (HPQ) algorithm, and the vehicle planning and control algorithm. In the HPQ algorithm, a vehicle priority management model considering the difference between CAVs and CHVs is built to design the right of way management for CAVs and CHVs, respectively. In the lower level for vehicle planning and control algorithm, different control modes of CAVs are designed according to the upper level decision made by the HPQ algorithm. Moreover, the vehicle control execution is realized by the model predictive controller combined with the geographical environment constraints and the unsignalized intersection management strategy. The proposed strategy is evaluated by simulations, which show that the proposed intersection management strategy can effectively reduce travel time and improve traffic efficiency. The intersection management strategy captures the real-world balance between efficiency and safety for potential future intelligent traffic systems.