Integrity-Based Path Planning Strategy for Urban Autonomous Vehicular Navigation Using GPS and Cellular Signals
Lee, Halim, Seo, Jiwon, Kassas, Zaher M
Abstract
An integrity-based path planning strategy for autonomous ground vehicle (AGV)\nnavigation in urban environments is developed. The vehicle is assumed to\nnavigate by utilizing cellular long-term evolution (LTE) signals in addition to\nGlobal Positioning System (GPS) signals. Given a desired destination, an\noptimal path is calculated, which minimizes a cost function that considers both\nthe horizontal protection level (HPL) and travel distance. The constraints are\nthat (i) the ratio of nodes with faulty signals to the total nodes be lower\nthan a maximum allowable ratio and (ii) the HPLs along each candidate path be\nlower than the horizontal alert limit (HAL). To predict the faults and HPL\nbefore the vehicle is driven, GPS and LTE pseudoranges along the candidate\npaths are generated utilizing a commercial ray-tracing software and\nthree-dimensional (3D) terrain and building maps. Simulated pseudoranges inform\nthe path planning algorithm about potential biases due to reflections from\nbuildings in urban environments. Simulation results are presented showing that\nthe optimal path produced by the proposed path planning strategy has the\nminimum average HPL among the candidate paths.