Method of operating a vehicle in a vehicle storage environment

• Main Author: Andrew Fairgrieve
• Format: Patent
• Language: English
• Published: 27.03.2019
• Subjects: CONJOINT CONTROL OF VEHICLE SUB-UNITS OF DIFFERENT TYPE ORDIFFERENT FUNCTION; CONTROL SYSTEMS SPECIALLY ADAPTED FOR HYBRID VEHICLES; CONTROLLING; LAND VEHICLES FOR TRAVELLING OTHERWISE THAN ON RAILS; MOTOR VEHICLES; PERFORMING OPERATIONS; PHYSICS; REGULATING; ROAD VEHICLE DRIVE CONTROL SYSTEMS FOR PURPOSES NOT RELATED TOTHE CONTROL OF A PARTICULAR SUB-UNIT; SIGNALLING; SYSTEMS FOR CONTROLLING OR REGULATING NON-ELECTRIC VARIABLES; TRAFFIC CONTROL SYSTEMS; TRAILERS; TRANSPORTING; VEHICLES IN GENERAL

A method for operating an autonomous vehicle 100 within a vehicle storage environment 200 e.g. car park, taxi rank etc., comprising: receiving data at the vehicle, the data including vehicle storage environment information; using the data to direct the vehicle to join a first queue 208a-c of a network of vehicle queues 210, and operating the vehicle in dependence on the data to move through the network of vehicle queues. The data may include directional information for the vehicle to navigate through the storage environment, or include information relating to the length of time the vehicle is expected to remain in the storage environment. Upon reaching the front of a queue, the vehicle may move to a collection area, join the back of another queue, or wait to receive further instructions. Also claimed is a method of operating a vehicle storage environment comprising: identifying an autonomous vehicle entering the storage environment; receiving data about the vehicle relating to a period of storage time in the environment; directing the vehicle autonomously to a queue of a network based on the data.