String stability of commercial adaptive cruise control vehicles: WIP abstract

Abstract

Adaptive cruise control (ACC) is the first wave of vehicle automation that will reach the mainstream. It has been shown in [3] that automation of a small fraction of vehicles in traffic (e.g., 5%) can change the emergent properties of the flow, for example by dissipating phantom jams. Substantial theoretical and experimental underpinnings of vehicle automation and platooning were established in the from the USDOT Automated Highway System effort [1]. However, it is not yet clear whether the ACC vehicles that are currently commercially available will dampen or amplify phantom jams.