Warning:
This page is provided for historical and archival purposes only. While the seminar dates are correct, we offer no guarantee of informational accuracy or link validity. Contact information for the speakers, hosts and seminar committee are certainly out of date.

RI SEMINAR -- Chuck Thorpe

• WHEN: Friday, Jan 20, 1994; 3:30 pm - 5:00 pm Refreshments will be served starting at 3:15 pm
• WHERE: ADAMSON WING Auditorium in Baker Hall
• SPEAKER: Chuck Thorpe

       Senior Research Scientist
       Robotics Institute
     

• TITLE: The Automated Highway System

ABSTRACT

CMU is part of a consortium that won a major award from the Department of Transportation to build a prototype Automated Highway System (AHS). The AHS will allow specially-equipped cars, trucks, and buses to operate autonomously on specially-equipped highway lanes. The goals are to increase safety, and decrease congestion, without having to build more miles of highways.

The technical challenges include: sensors (radar, laser, video); control (very close vehicle spacing); communications (vehicle-to-vehicle and -to-infrastructure); reliable computing; and system control (coordinating merging, lane changes, etc.). The non-technical challenges are just as large: land use; equity; deployment; liability; and environmental impact.

The project is just underway. This talk will focus less on results, and more on the plans, the potential systems, and the required work.