Analyzing the Remote Operation Task to Support Highly Automated Vehicles – Suggesting the Core Task Analysis to Ensure the Human-Centered Design of the Remote Operation Station

Intelligent technology and high automation solutions will need to be integrated into the future’s sustainable traffic systems. However, for a long time, automatic vehicles cannot be expected to cope with all possible traffic situations without a human intervention. In the EU-funded Hi-Drive project, remote operation has been proposed as one feasible solution for these situations. However, the remote operation of an automatic vehicle is a new work task/profession whose requirements are not yet properly known. In this paper, we propose the core task analysis as a way to better comprehend the challenges of the safety-critical task of remotely controlling highly automated vehicles in open road settings and demonstrate the core task analysis method with the operative situations from the scenario catalogue. The operating environment imposes certain demands on the operators, who need to use their trained skills and knowledge to deal with them. The results of the core task analysis highlight the environmental demands and the critical resources and competence the human operator should have. Core task analysis may be most helpful in comprehending the demands of remote operator tasks in supporting the highly automated vehicles as well as carrying out human-centered design of operating workplace.