Enhancing Truck Platooning Mobility by Cutting Through Traffic Like a Snake: Methodology and Field Test Analysis*

Truck platooning is a promising technology, especially reducing fuel consumption. However, conventional truck platooning methods are short of field tests and lack the capability of platoon lane-change. It impedes the large-scale implementation, since a truck platoon may usually be blocked by a slow-moving vehicle. To address this challenge, we propose a truck platooning controller with lane change capability. This controller is highlighted for the following features: i) enhancing mobility by cutting through traffic one-by-one like a snake; ii) enhancing string stability by formulating in the spatial domain; iii) enhancing planning accuracy by utilizing a tractor-semitrailer-based truck dynamics model; iv) ready for large-scale implementation since it passes our field tests. Results have demonstrated that the proposed controller enhances the mobility of truck platooning by 7.44%.