Autonomous Shuttle Integrated in a Communication and Sensing City Infrastructure

Abstract

On the road to autonomous mobility, this paper presents a platform that has been developed to run an autonomous shuttle in the city of Aveiro, in Portugal. The autonomous shuttle was integrated within the living lab infrastructure in the city, equipped with sensors and with an On-Board Unit (OBU) with Vehicle to Everything (V2X) communications. Through this approach, the shuttle is able to communicate and exchange information with the infrastructure and other vehicles, exchanging Collective Perception Messages (CPMs) with information regarding perceived objects from the sensors installed in the vehicles and in the roads.This platform also contains a web platform that is able to provide real-time information from both communication and sensing devices in both the vehicle and infrastructure, including the information on the virtual traffic lights.The obtained results show the correct operation of the shuttle according to the context of the road and the objects/obstacles detected, the detection performance, the timely reaction to the events, and the great user experience feedback from the users experiencing the travel.