JP7173750B2 - Map information generation device, automatic driving system, and automatic driving control information generation device - Google Patents

Description

The present disclosure relates to a map information generation device, an automatic driving system, and an automatic driving control information generation device.

Currently, technologies for automatically driving vehicles are actively being developed. In automatic driving, it is important to determine the current position of the vehicle. The current position of the vehicle can generally be determined, for example, by determining the current coordinates of the vehicle by means of a Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) and by determining the orientation of the vehicle by means of sensors.

In the navigation technology using GNSS, map information is stored in a storage unit such as a database (DB), and a user inputs a destination to the input destination based on the map information stored in the storage unit. Explore directions route.

For example, Patent Literature 1 describes a problem of "executing a route search that can respond to control by an advanced driving support system", and describes "a map including information on an advanced driving support control allowable section in which a vehicle travels under advanced driving support control. A storage unit that stores information, an acquisition unit that acquires current position information of the vehicle, a search unit that searches for a route from the position indicated by the current position information to a destination, and an input to change the route to the destination. An input reception unit and a determination unit for determining whether or not the user can drive the vehicle. When it is determined that the vehicle cannot be driven, the route is not changed to a section other than the advanced driving support control allowable section" (see the abstract of Patent Document 1).

JP 2017-106863 A

Normally, a high-precision map ECU (map information generation device) converts into a high-precision route based on IVI (In-Vehicle Infotainment) map route information acquired from an automatic driving ECU (automatic driving control device), and corresponds to it. Output high-precision map information to the automatic driving control device. This high-precision map information is used for processing such as generation of a travel plan, control during travel, and provision of peripheral information during travel on the side of the automatic driving control device.

When executing multiple hardness driving support controls as in Patent Document 1, the range of route information (for example, node and link information) acquired to generate a travel plan and the range of route information acquired to perform control during travel The range (for example, the range up to several kilometers from the vehicle) is about the same as the range of information along the route (map information, lane marking information, and feature information along the route).

However, if the route information acquired to generate the driving plan and the information along the route acquired to control the driving are obtained in the same range, the amount of data becomes excessive, and the processing on the automatic driving control device side. There is also the problem that the load on the
The present disclosure has been made in view of such circumstances, and provides a technique for reducing the volume of map information to be output.

As a result of intensive study of the above problems by the present inventors, it was found that route information (information on nodes and links) is necessary in a relatively wide range for generating a driving plan, but information along the route is necessary for automatic driving. It was found that the amount of information is sufficient, and that a range similar to that of route information is not necessary. In addition, it was found that even if the range of surrounding information during driving is further narrowed, it does not affect automatic driving control.

A map information generating device according to the present disclosure is a map information generating device that generates map information used for automatic driving control of a vehicle, and includes route information within a first distance range from the current position of the vehicle, and route information within a first distance from the current position of the vehicle. First map information of a range of a second distance shorter than one distance is generated and output.

Further features related to the present disclosure will become apparent from the description of the specification and the accompanying drawings. In addition, the aspects of the present disclosure will be achieved and attained by means of the elements and combinations of various elements and aspects of the detailed description that follows and the claims that follow.
It should be understood that the description herein is merely exemplary and is not intended to limit the scope or application of the claims in any way.

According to the present disclosure, it is possible to reduce the volume of map information output from the high-precision map ECU.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS It is a figure which shows the structural example of the automatic driving system 1 which concerns on this embodiment. FIG. 10 is a diagram showing an example in which priority is given to each candidate for a recommended lane; 4 is a diagram illustrating a procedure for setting the priority of a recommended lane by a route information conversion unit 17; FIG. It is a figure which shows the internal structural example of the map information output part 16 by this embodiment. It is a figure which shows an example of information output (transmission) in this embodiment.

<Configuration example of automated driving system>
FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a configuration example of an automatic driving system 1 according to this embodiment. This automatic driving system 1 includes a high-precision map ECU 10 (HD MAP ECU: map information generation device) that generates and outputs detailed route information and high-precision map information, and an automatic driving ECU 20 (AD ECU (automatic driving control device) and a communication module 30 . The high-precision map ECU 10 is installed in a vehicle (not shown) to be automatically driven, and is an arithmetic control unit that functions as a route generation device that generates information regarding the route.

The high-precision map ECU 10 and the automatic driving ECU 20 can be connected by, for example, Ethernet, which is a well-known communication standard. Further, the automatic driving ECU 20 and the communication module 30 can be connected to an external device (not shown) by a communication standard such as CAN, LIN, MOST, FlexRay, or a combination thereof. The listed communication standards are examples and are not intended to be limiting.

The automatic driving ECU 20 outputs IVI (In-Vehicle Infotainment) route information for automatic driving to the high-precision map ECU 10, and generates in the high-precision map ECU 10 based on the IVI route information and the high-precision map information. It is a control unit that executes automatic driving control using detailed route information (planned travel route). The IVI route information is generated by a vehicle-mounted navigation system (not shown), and includes information such as the latitude and longitude of multiple points along the route between the current location and the destination.

The high-precision map ECU 10 includes, for example, a gyro/acceleration sensor 11, a GNSS receiver 12, a map updating unit 13, a high-precision map information storage unit 14, a vehicle position estimation unit 15, and a map information output unit 16. , and a route information conversion unit 17 .

The gyro/acceleration sensor 11 is a detector that measures angular velocity, acceleration, and/or speed of the vehicle. The GNSS receiver 12 is a receiver that acquires the absolute position coordinates of the vehicle from the GNSS system. The map update unit 13 receives update data of the high-precision map from the outside via the communication module 30, and updates the high-precision map information. The high-precision map information storage unit 14 is a data holding unit that stores updated high-precision map information.

The vehicle position estimation unit 15 (locator) estimates the current absolute position of the vehicle based on the absolute position coordinates of the vehicle acquired by the GNSS receiver 12, and the angular velocity, acceleration, vehicle speed, etc. acquired by the gyro / acceleration sensor 11. is used to estimate the relative position of the vehicle with respect to the absolute position coordinates. The relative position represents the vehicle position with higher precision than the absolute position, and also has a role of complementing the coordinates obtained intermittently via GNSS. Then, the own vehicle position estimation unit 15 executes a map matching process for correcting the calculated vehicle position using the high-precision map information stored in the high-precision map information storage unit 14, and the corrected vehicle position (self vehicle position) to the map information output unit 16, and outputs the vehicle position (own vehicle position), vehicle orientation, sensor detection information, travel road information, and travel lane information to the automatic driving ECU 20. In addition, the own vehicle position estimation unit 15 also receives vehicle information related to the vehicle to be automatically driven and image information (camera recognition result) captured by a camera mounted on the vehicle from the automatic driving ECU 20, and estimates the relative position. can also be used for

The map information output unit 16 outputs the high-precision map information read from the high-precision map information storage unit 14, the current vehicle position (vehicle position) estimated by the vehicle position estimation unit 15, and the route information conversion unit 17. Based on the planned travel route (detailed route information) and the recommended lane information obtained in step 1, the high-precision map information storage unit 14 is referred to, and the route information used for planning the travel plan and the route information for travel control Map information along the route and peripheral map information to be used are generated and output to an automatic driving ECU (automatic driving control device) 20 . Details of the map information output unit 16 will be described later. Here, the route information includes detailed route information and recommended lane information within a predetermined range (for example, 7 km) of the route from the vehicle position to the destination. The along-route map information is map information including road section line information, sign information, feature information, etc. existing within a predetermined range along the found route (for example, along the route 2 km ahead of the vehicle position). The peripheral map information is map information including information on signs, information on features, etc. existing around the vehicle position (for example, within a radius of 200 m).

The route information conversion unit 17 converts the IVI route information (first route information) acquired from the automatic driving ECU 20 and the link/node data included in the high-precision map information acquired from the high-precision map information storage unit 14. performs data matching, and according to the result, generates detailed route information (second route information: scheduled travel route), which is route information with higher precision than IVI route information, and outputs it to the automatic driving ECU 20 . The route information conversion unit 17 also acquires information on the position of the vehicle from the vehicle position estimation unit 15, and reflects the information on the position of the vehicle in the detailed route information. Then, the route information conversion unit 17 generates and outputs recommended lane information indicating a lane on which the vehicle is recommended to travel. The recommended lane information includes the lane priority calculated for each recommended lane as pair information. The priority here is information indicating how desirable it is for the vehicle to travel to reach the destination of the planned travel route. The process of identifying the recommended lane candidates will be described later.

<Recommended lane information generation processing>
As described above, the route information conversion unit 17 generates information indicating lanes on which the vehicle is recommended to travel in addition to processing for generating detailed route information, and transmits the information to the map information output unit 16 . When generating the recommended lane information, priority is given to each candidate for the recommended lane. FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example in which priority is given to each recommended lane candidate. For example, it is assumed that the planned travel route is given as shown in the left diagram of FIG. 2 and the actual roads are configured as shown in the right diagram of FIG. The destination of the planned travel route exists beyond the branch road. In order to reach the destination, it is desirable for the vehicle to travel toward the fork road, so the lane leading to the fork road is set with a high priority. The priority decreases as the distance from the branch road increases. If the destination cannot be reached after passing the fork, the priority of the lane after the fork is set to the lowest. Whether or not the destination can be reached can be determined based on, for example, whether or not the vehicle can reach the destination within a predetermined distance traveled.

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating a procedure for setting the priority of the recommended lanes by the route information conversion unit 17. As shown in FIG. Here, it is assumed that a vehicle is traveling on a road as shown in the right diagram of FIG. The high-precision map information storage unit 14 stores high-precision map information that describes lanes in terms of connection relationships of links. It is assumed that the road shown in the right diagram of FIG. 2 is described as shown in the left diagram of FIG. 3, and the vehicle is heading for the destination at the end of the branch road.

The detailed route information (planned travel route) calculated by the route information conversion unit 17 describes the route from the current position of the vehicle to the destination for a predetermined distance (for example, 7 km). The planned travel route does not necessarily describe only the shortest route (hereinafter referred to as the main path), but also describes the branch roads branching off from the shortest route (hereinafter referred to as sub-paths). There may be Therefore, as shown in the left diagram of FIG. 3, the planned travel route may include lanes on which the vehicle cannot reach the destination. In the lane recommendation information generation process, the route information conversion unit 17 determines a recommended lane from a set of main paths and sub paths.

The route information conversion unit 17 first initializes the priority of all lanes included in the planned travel route from the current position of the vehicle to the destination (step (1)). For example, set all lanes to "low" priority.

The route information conversion unit 17 sets the lowest priority to the lane that cannot reach the destination (step (2)). In FIG. 3, the priority is "x". The criteria for determining whether the destination can be reached are as described above.

The route information conversion unit 17 sets the highest priority to the lane that is directly connected to the destination (step (3)). In FIG. 3, the priority is "high". Here, "directly connected" means that the lane itself is connected to the destination without going through another lane. The same applies to the following.

The route information conversion unit 17 sets the highest priority to the lane directly connected to the lane for which the highest priority was set in the previous step (step (4)). The route information conversion unit 17 repeats step (4) until the current position of the vehicle is reached. According to the above procedure, the recommended lane candidates and the priority of each candidate are set as shown in the right diagram of FIG. 2 and the right diagram of FIG. The route information converter 17 outputs recommended lanes and their priorities. For example, the lane ID and priority described in the high-precision map may be paired and output.

<Configuration example of the map information output unit>
FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an internal configuration example of the map information output unit 16 according to this embodiment. The map information output unit 16 includes a recommended lane information acquisition unit 161, a route information acquisition unit 162, a position acquisition unit 163, a map information acquisition unit 164, and a map information generation unit 165.

The recommended lane information acquisition unit 161 acquires recommended lane information from the route information conversion unit 17 . The route information acquisition unit 162 acquires detailed route information as a travel route from the route information conversion unit 17 . The position acquisition unit 163 acquires information on the current position of the vehicle from the vehicle position estimation unit 15 .
The map information acquisition unit 164 acquires necessary map information from the high-precision map information storage unit 14 based on a command from the map information generation unit 165 .

The map information generation unit 165 generates current position information, planned travel route information, and recommended lane information with respect to route information including recommended lane information, which is information necessary for making a travel plan on the autonomous driving ECU 20 side. , to generate route information up to a first distance (as an example, route information up to 7 km ahead, but not limited to 7 km) and recommended lane information. Specifically, the route from the current position to the destination is specified, and the link and node information (node position information and link length information) from the current position to the first distance ahead is generated as route information. be done. In addition, recommended lane information for determining which lane the vehicle should travel on on the side of the automatic driving ECU 20 is included in the route information.

Further, the map information generation unit 165 uses map information along the travel route as information for enabling control during travel, specifying from the vehicle position a second distance ahead that is shorter than the first distance. A command is issued to the map information acquisition unit 164 to specify and acquire map information up to (for example, 2 km ahead, but not limited to this). Then, the map information generation unit 165 acquires the corresponding map information from the map information acquisition unit 164 in response to the command. This along-route map information includes, for example, lane marking information along the route (location and length of lane markings, etc.), information on features along the route (types of features, positions, etc.), signs along the route, and so on. It is information including information (type of sign, position, etc.). In addition, a feature is a concept of a thing according to the definition of the Geospatial Information Authority of Japan, for example, and refers to the concept of all things on the ground, regardless of whether they are natural or man-made, such as rivers, mountains, plants, bridges, It means what is given to things that exist in the real world, such as railways, buildings, and administrative circles.

Further, the map information generation unit 165 generates map information of the surroundings of the vehicle position (range having a radius of a third distance shorter than the second distance: an example of a radius of 200 m, but not limited to this). A command is issued to the map information acquisition unit 164 to acquire. Then, the map information generation unit 165 acquires the corresponding map information from the map information acquisition unit 164 in response to the command. The surrounding map information includes, for example, features existing within 200 m around the vehicle (feature type, position, etc.), sign information (sign type, position, etc.), information on nearby roads unrelated to the driving route. , oncoming lane information, information on other vehicles traveling behind, and the like.

Further, when the map information output unit 16 outputs (transmits) route information, map information along the route, and surrounding map information to the automatic driving ECU 20 regarding the vehicle that is running, the previously output information and the currently generated information are combined. You may make it output only the difference of to automatic driving ECU20.

<About transmission of difference information>
FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an example of information output (transmission) in this embodiment. When the vehicle is traveling between node A and node B at time T1 (see the left diagram in FIG. 5), the map information output unit 16 determines that the vehicle is located 7 km from node A, which is the starting point of the link on which the vehicle is located. Route information up to the node included up to the point, and map information along the route 2 km ahead from node A (for example, to node C) (sign information, feature information, etc. along the route are linked to links between nodes). (where the vehicle is located) and peripheral map information within a radius of 200 m from the position of the vehicle. Note that the surrounding map information is not necessarily information associated with a link, and information such as features existing within a radius of 200 m from the vehicle position is acquired and output. Then, when the vehicle is traveling between node B and node C at time T2 (T2>T1) (see the right diagram of FIG. 5), the map information output unit 16 outputs the link on which the vehicle is located. Route information from node B, which is the starting point of the car, to nodes included up to 7 km ahead, map information along the route from node B to node D included in 2 km, and surrounding map information with a radius of 200 m from the position of the vehicle Instead of outputting, at time T2, only the information that could not be acquired at time T1, that is, the information obtained by subtracting the information acquired at time T1 from the information acquired at time T2 from the information acquired at time T2 ( difference information). In the example on the right side of FIG. 5, regarding the along-route map information, information such as features linked to the link between node C and node B is output.

In the description of FIG. 5 above, the acquisition range of route information (7 km) and the acquisition range of map information along the route (2 km) are determined from the node that is the starting point of the link of the route traveled by the vehicle. The information acquisition range may be determined from the current position of the vehicle. In the description of FIG. 5, the route information acquisition range is up to the node included in the route information acquisition range (7 km), and the route map information acquisition range is up to the node included in the route map information acquisition range (2 km). However, the information acquisition range may be 7 km or 2 km from the current position of the vehicle. Further, when the vehicle is on a link between two nodes 7 km or 2 km from the current position of the vehicle, the information acquisition range may be up to the node at the end of the link. Also, regarding the route information (for 7 km) including the recommended lane information, it is not necessary to output the difference information.

<Summary>
(i) As described above, in the present embodiment, when map information is output to the automatic driving ECU 20, route information including recommended lane information is output within a range of 7 km from the vehicle position. will only output a range of 2 km. As for the surrounding environment (surrounding map information), only the range within a radius of 200 m from the vehicle position is output. That is, the relationship of route information output distance>along route map information output distance>peripheral map information output distance is satisfied. Since the route requires a relatively long distance, information is output in a relatively long distance range, but detailed information such as map / surrounding environment information that is necessary for automatic driving of the own vehicle in automatic driving control is not included. A range of distances shorter than the route information is sufficient. By doing so, the amount of data to be processed can be reduced. Therefore, the processing load of the high-accuracy map ECU 10 and the automatic driving ECU 20 can be reduced.

(ii) In the present embodiment, the map information generation device (high-precision map ECU) generates route information for a first distance range (for example, 7 km from the current position) from the current position of the vehicle to the destination, and and the first map information within a range of a second distance (for example, 2 km from the current position) that is shorter than the first distance from the current position of is generated and output. Thus, by narrowing the generation range of the map information rather than the route information, it is possible to reduce the amount of data to be transmitted to the automatic driving control device side.

The first map information is map information (limited to information along the route) along the route from the current position to the destination. As a result, it is possible to output the information that is essential for the running control of the vehicle in just the right amount.

Further, the map information generation device generates and outputs second map information of a range having a radius of a third distance (for example, 200 m from the current position) that is shorter than the second distance from the current position of the vehicle. The second map information is not limited to map information along the travel route, and includes information on features existing in all directions, front and back, left and right, of the vehicle. As a result, the surrounding environment of the vehicle can be grasped on the side of the automatic driving ECU. In addition, since this surrounding environment information (second map information) is more detailed (detailed) information than the first map information (including information on buildings and roads unrelated to the route), We are reducing the amount of data rather than information.

In addition, in this embodiment, when updating the information to be output to the automatic driving ECU side, the information included in the information output last time (time of T1) is not output (transmitted), and this time (time of T2) is newly generated. output (transmit) only the information obtained (hereinafter referred to as "transmission processing of only difference information"). This can further reduce the amount of data to be output. The process of transmitting only the difference information may be applied to all of the route information (including the recommended lane information), the first map information, and the second map information, or may be applied to one of the first map information and the second map information. , or only to both.

The map information generating device (high-precision map ECU) according to the present embodiment can also be called an automatic driving control information generating device that generates information used for automatic driving control of the vehicle. In this case, the automatic driving control information generating device is a position acquisition unit that acquires the current position of the vehicle, the first type information used when planning the travel plan of the vehicle, and the second type information used during travel control of the vehicle and an automatic driving control information generation unit (corresponding to the map information generation unit 165) that generates and outputs the Then, the automatic driving information generation unit generates first type information (route information) in the range of the first distance from the current position of the vehicle, and second type information in the range of the second distance shorter than the first distance from the current position of the vehicle. information (map information along the route) and output to the automatic driving ECU. In this way, by varying the range to be generated (how far from the current position of the vehicle to be generated) according to the type of information to be transmitted, the amount of data to be output can be reduced, and the high-precision map ECU and automatic The processing load on the driving ECU can be reduced.

(iii) Modifications The present disclosure is not limited to the above embodiments, and includes various modifications. For example, the above embodiments have been described in detail to facilitate understanding of the present disclosure, and are not necessarily limited to those having all the described configurations. Also, part of the configuration of one embodiment can be replaced with the configuration of another embodiment, and the configuration of another embodiment can be added to the configuration of one embodiment. Moreover, it is possible to add, delete, or replace part of the configuration of each embodiment with another configuration.

Some or all of the above configurations, functions, processing units, processing means, etc. may be realized by hardware, for example, by designing integrated circuits. Moreover, each of the above configurations, functions, etc. may be realized by software by a processor interpreting and executing a program for realizing each function. Information such as programs, tables, and files that implement each function can be stored in recording devices such as memories, hard disks, SSDs (Solid State Drives), or recording media such as IC cards and SD cards. Further, the control lines and information lines indicate those considered necessary for explanation, and not all control lines and information lines are necessarily indicated on the product. In practice, it may be considered that almost all configurations are interconnected.

1 Automatic driving system 10 High precision map ECU
20 Autonomous driving ECU
30 communication module 11 gyro/acceleration sensor 12 GNSS receiver 13 map update unit 14 high-precision map information storage unit 15 own vehicle position estimation unit 16 map information output unit 17 route information conversion unit

Claims (3)

A map information generating device for generating map information used for automatic driving control of a vehicle,
a position acquisition unit that acquires the current position of the vehicle;
a route information acquisition unit that acquires route information describing a planned travel route from the current position of the vehicle to a destination;
a map information acquisition unit that acquires high-precision map information;
a map information generation unit that acquires and outputs desired map information from the high-precision map information acquired by the map information acquisition unit based on the current position of the vehicle and the route information;
Acquisition of recommended lane information indicating a recommended lane on which the vehicle is recommended to travel among lanes of a road constituting the planned travel route, the recommended lane information being in a range of a first distance from the current position of the vehicle. and a recommended lane information acquisition unit for
(i) the route information and the recommended lane information within the range of the first distance; and (ii) the range of a second distance shorter than the first distance from the current position of the vehicle. ( iii ) a third distance shorter than the second distance from the current position of the vehicle; and a second map information of a range with a radius of
the first map information includes road division lines and feature information along the route;
the second map information includes feature information in a range having a radius equal to the third distance, other than features along the route;
The map information generation unit further outputs, at a second time point temporally later than the first time point, information included in the information generated at the first time point out of the information generated at the second time point. and outputting only information newly generated at the second point in time . A map information generating device according to claim 1;
an automatic driving control device that receives the route information of the range of the first distance and the first map information of the range of the second distance from the map information generating device, and controls automatic driving of the vehicle;
automatic driving system. In claim 2 ,
The automatic driving control device uses the route information when making a driving plan for the vehicle, and uses the first map information when controlling the vehicle when driving.

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