ALFRIED – Automated and networked driving in logistics at the Friedrichshafen test site

Inner-city goods transport and works traffic are a challenge for the complex traffic system. This traffic is often perceived as an obstacle or even a danger to other road users. Improved traffic flow can increase traffic efficiency for the safety of all road users, reduce congestion and achieve positive environmental effects for neighbouring residents. Digitalisation, automation and networking provide solutions for this.

Complex mobility systems are optimised and further developed

The aim of ALFRIED is to further develop the complex mobility system of the city of Friedrichshafen with a focus on infrastructure and the Smart City control centre. As a medium-sized German centre, Friedrichshafen offers an excellent field of application for a mobility concept that can be transferred to many cities and regions. Automated and connected driving (AVF), data integration, route optimisation, disruption prediction and intelligent real-time information are intended to optimise inner-city goods journeys between plant locations in such a way as to reduce journeys and/or the associated emissions and relieve inner-city traffic volumes.

The infrastructure components, concepts and systems for AVF newly researched, tested and developed as part of ALFRIED contribute to solving the problem. These include a sensor fusion concept for complex junctions and the development of intelligent delineators for AVF in difficult driving situations. Data from vehicles, infrastructure and the environment is enriched with various data sources in a digital platform and evaluated, analysed, displayed and optimised via the new Smart City control centre. The technologies will initially be tested in a demonstration environment (indoor and outdoor) and then in real traffic at the digital test site in Friedrichshafen, particularly along a main inner-city traffic route, which is also a transit route and works traffic route.

Utilisation of the tool chains of the Test Bed Lower Saxony

In this project, the DLR Institute of Transportation Systems is researching the coordination of the content of test fields with each other as part of the Test Bed Lower Saxony in order to standardise the interfaces and form an initial reference for test fields in Germany. This is being done here using the example of the Friedrichshafen test field, but can be transferred to other test fields. The tool chain of the Test Bed Lower Saxony is used there to illustrate the transfer possibilities. "ALFRIED is therefore an important building block for us for harmonised access to the test fields in Germany," explains Lennart Asbach, Head of the Verification and Validation Department, Institute of Transportation Systems, German Aerospace Center (DLR).