This research proposes a distributed Successive Platoon-Lane-Change (SuPLC) controller based on optimal control. It is designed for the entire Cooperative Adaptive Cruise Control (CACC) platoon to cut through traffic like a gluttonous snake. This proposed controller fills the gap in CACC PLC control and has the following contributions: i) introduces a distributed trajectory planner while maintaining inter-vehicle cooperation; ii) is able to change lane successively like a gluttonous snake in order to improve success rate of lane change; iii) is formulated in the spatial domain, with lateral and longitudinal coupled vehicle dynamics; iv) with local stability, string stability, and lateral stability. The proposed SuPLC controller is evaluated in an integrated simulation platform with PreScan and Matlab/Simulink. Results confirm that the proposed controller can fulfill the expectations. The average computation time of the proposed SuPLC controller is 0.015 seconds on a laptop equipped with an Intel i7-8750H CPU. It indicates the potential of real-time implementation.

CICTP