Multi-lane Vehicular Platoons Merging Strategy Based on Distributed Model Predictive Control

In this paper, the scenarios of merging multi-lane vehicular platoons into a single lane are studied. Firstly, the bicycle model is established as vehicle dynamics and the merging process is parameterized as the transitioning from any initial formation to a single-lane formation. Secondly, the vehicles are numbered using a distance-related method and a target platoon is defined to describe their desired state. Then, a two-stage merging strategy is proposed and the DMPC controllers are respectively designed, where both control input constraints and collision avoidance constraints are considered. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed method is verified by a numerical simulation.