Representative Safety Assessment of Autonomous Vehicle for Public Transportation

The implementations and testing in real conditions of Autonomous Vehicles (AV) for private usage show important advances. However, a lack still exists in addressing the particularities of AVs for Public Transportation. Such particularities range from limited safety mechanisms aboard, risky situations associated to particular users and complex self-driving situations up to the limited passengers-vehicle interactions possible. Since, to our knowledge, no comprehensive safety assessment actually exists and the current automotive related standards do not address identified aspects, in this paper, we propose to conduct a minimal but representative safety assessment based upon a local but real autonomous vehicle implementation. To conduct our study, the Hazard Analysis and Risks Assessment introduced in the ISO 26262 standard is taken as a basis. Initial outcomes suggest that critical autonomy aspects, like machine learning of complex operational situations, the metrics for quantitative assessment of autonomy, and potential conflicts between autonomy principles and external safety fences can have critical safety impacts and demand further discussions.