Pros and Cons of Self Driving Vans - A Real Life Motorway Case Study Analysis from Great Britain

Given the speculations that autonomous vehicles are sure to take over the transport sectors in the near future, this study micro-simulates the impacts of automating the vehicle VAN using the micro-simulation software AIMSUN in a hypothetical condition. This study analyses the impacts of automation of vans in different levels of automation penetrations with heterogeneous traffic conditions on traffic parameters such as speed and different environmental factors and should only be considered as a case approach with minimal application in the real-world scenario. In this study, the impacts of automation of van in different road characteristics were also analyzed in detail. The study highlights that with an increase in van automation penetrations, traffic parameters speed is positively impacted while negative impacts on environmental conditions are observed. This is mostly because multiple analysis should have been carried out to have a complete understanding of the network.