Jaguar Land Rover is planning to create a fleet of over 100 research vehicles in the next four years to test autonomous and connected technology, with the first cars due to arrive the streets later this year.
The company plan to test the vehicles on a new 41 mile test route on motorways and urban roads around Coventry and Solihull .
Initial tests will involve vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure communications.
The move will allow the vehicles to communicate with each other about roadside signs, overhead gantries and traffic lights.
Communication and data sharing between vehicles would pave the way for better commuting in the future where autonomous vehicles would communicate with one another and co-operate during lane change and crossing junctions. This will make commuting in autonomous vehicles much safer.
Jaguar Land Rover head of research Tony Harper said: Our connected and automated technology could help improve traffic flow, cut congestion and reduce the potential for accidents.
"We will also improve the driving experience, with drivers able to choose how much support and assistance they need. In traffic, for example, the driver could choose autonomy assist during tedious or stressful parts of the journey.
According to the company, the sensors on-board its autonomous vehicles would include a stereo camera which can generate 3D view of the road and together with advanced image processing technology and easily recognise potholes, traffic cones and other barriers such as roadworks and quickly identify an ideal path for the car to take.
This information can either be passed on to the driver by the way of alerts and if there is no response from the driver, it can apply small steering assistance and avoid any collisions.
In traffic jams, getting too close to vehicles in front and while entering into junctions is a common cause of accidents. These are low speed collisions and can be avoided with autonomous technology. Also, sometimes low speed collisions can be caused by mistakenly putting the vehicle in drive instead of reverse or vice versa.
The company is also developing assistance system to prevent these types of collisions and a technology which can send signals to nearby vehicles about hazard ahead warning to avoid collisions.
The technology will also be equipped to decipher the direction from which emergency vehicle sirens are coming from so that the autonomous vehicle can make way for them.
Apart from this, Jaguar Land Rover is also testing autonomous vehicles which drive over any surface or terrain. This is possible with several sensing technologies including camera, ultrasonic, radar and LiDAR which will offer a 360 degree view and coupled with artificial intelligence can calculate the safest route possible.
