GCDC essentials

The Grand Cooperative Driving Challenge (GCDC) aims at accelerating the development and implementation of cooperative driving technologies. Therefore a bi-annual event will be organized where international R&D teams from all over the world (Europe, Asia, America and Australia) are being challenged to develop their own cooperative driving systems. The first finals will be in March 2011, where teams have to negotiate their vehicles as efficiently as possible through a range of predetermined traffic scenarios on public roads. So, the GCDC is actually an innovative competitive demonstration.

Schematic representation of Cooperative Driving.

Cooperative driving enables a more efficient use of existing infrastructure which reduces the expenditures and land use for new roads. Cooperative driving is based on intelligent communication between vehicles and between vehicles and their environment. Studies (TNO report 2008-D-R0996/A: "Smarter and better - the benefits of intelligent traffic")  have shown that by 2022 cooperative driving will be able to reduce the time lost to traffic jams by up to 50%, traffic fatalities by 8% and CO2 emission and fuel consumption by 5%.  have shown that by 2022 cooperative driving will be able to reduce the time lost to traffic jams by up to 50%, traffic fatalities by 8% and CO2 emission and fuel consumption by 5%.

The development and implementation of cooperative driving technologies stagnates due to a stalemate situation between governments and industries. Governments are waiting for industries until they start to develop cooperative driving systems whereas industries are waiting for the government until they provide the required technical infrastructure. Therefore, HTAS and TNO initiated the Grand Cooperative Driving Challenge (GCDC) in December 2008 in order to bring together all stakeholders and show them the potential of cooperative driving in realistic scenarios on public roads.

Cooperative driving enables a more efficient use of the existing infrastructure by enabling vehicles to drive closer to each other. Human reaction times are too large to drive closely behind another vehicle and today's advanced cruise control systems have their own problems. Current Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC) systems only react to the vehicle immediately in front of them; they are not able to predict overall traffic flow behaviours. Hence, ACC systems introduce shockwaves in a string of vehicles which will be amplified along the string, instead of damped. Cooperative driving systems are provided information about what is happening in their surroundings as well as what is going to happen in the near future. This will enable vehicles equipped with such a system to damp out and possibly prevent shockwaves in a string of vehicles.

The above described scenario is especially applicable on highways and rural roads without obstructions (traffic lights, intersections, etc). Within cities Cooperative Driving is a way to both improve traffic flow (increase the number of vehicles to drive through a green light) as well as reduce the amount of traffic accidents.