A New Control Strategy Integrated into the Desired Safety Margin Car-Following Model Considering the Disturbance Level

A vehicular communication system can provide motion information based on various sensors. Thus, adaptive cruise control (ACC) systems based on a reliable communication system can relieve traffic congestion in a platoon. However, acquiring vehicle information entails uncertainties because of the disturbance of traffic environment and vehicular communication systems, thereby influencing vehicle control performance. In this study, the desired safety margin (DSM) model is employed to investigate the influence of uncertainty on car-following performance, such as starting, emergency braking, and car-following processes. Based on the DSM model, the disturbance level on perceived safety margin is introduced to characterize the uncertainty of vehicle information. The stability criterion of the DSM model with the disturbance level is derived via linear stability theory. Analytical results indicate that a negative value of disturbance level will enlarge the stable region. By contrast, a positive value is conducive for maintaining the consensus state and achieving the high acceleration and deceleration of following vehicles in the starting process. Findings show that the disturbance in the vehicular system significantly influences car-following performance. To enhance the smoothness and stability of traffic flow evolution, a new control strategy is proposed in this study. Numerical experiments illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed control strategy in stabilizing traffic flow. This study highlights the need to resolve the stability of sensors and vehicular communication systems, and to develop the vehicular controller to help ACC systems improve vehicle control performance in the car-following process.