Decentralized optimal merging control for Connected and Automated Vehicles with safety constraint guarantees

Abstract This paper addresses the optimal control of Connected and Automated Vehicles (CAVs) arriving from two roads at a Merging Point (MP) where the objective is to jointly minimize the travel time and energy consumption of each CAV. The optimal solution can be used as a reference for tracking control and it guarantees that a speed-dependent safety constraint is satisfied both at the MP and everywhere within a Control Zone (CZ) which precedes it. We analyze the case of no active constraints and prove that under certain conditions the safety and speed constraints remain inactive, thus significantly simplifying the determination of an explicit decentralized solution. When these conditions do not apply, a complete solution is still obtained which includes all possible constraints becoming active. Our analysis allows us to study the tradeoff between the two objective function components (travel time and energy within the CZ). Simulation examples are provided to compare the performance of the optimal controller to a baseline consisting of human-driven vehicles with results showing improvements in both metrics.

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