Towards Automated Driving: Findings and Comparison with ADAS

The present contribution provides preliminary empirical findings concerning the first-in-literature independent experimental characterization of a commercially viable automated driving system in Europe. In particular, the paper reports on the testing campaign involving a type-approved Automated Lane Keeping System (ALKS) equipped vehicle and its comparison with the comparable driving assistance feature technology from the same vehicle: the Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC) system. The results suggest that the ALKS shows substantially enhanced performances with respect to ACC. In particular, both the string stability metrics and the reaction time show remarkable improvements. Additionally, the increased stability is not obtained via resorting to a significantly higher time gap which further motivates that string stable car-following is indeed feasible.