Microscopic Traffic Simulation Based Evaluation of Highly Automated Driving on Highways

Highly automated driving on highways requires a complex artificial intelligence that makes optimal decisions based on ongoing measurements. Notably no attempt has been performed to evaluate the impacts of such a sophisticated system on traffic. Another important point is the impact of continuous increase in the number of highly automated vehicles on future traffic safety and traffic flow. This work introduces a novel framework to evaluate these impacts in a developed microscopic traffic simulation environment. This framework is used on the one hand to ensure the functionality of the driving strategy in the early development stage. On the other hand, the impacts of increasing automation rates, up to hundred percent, on traffic safety and traffic flow is evaluated.