Gap Opening Control to Facilitate Human-Driven Vehicle Overtaking of Connected and Automated Vehicle Platoons on Two-Lane Highways

Connected and automated vehicle (CAV) platooning enhances fuel efficiency and operational performance but poses safety challenges when interacting with human-driven vehicles (HDVs) attempting to overtake on two-lane undivided highways. The close spacing within platoons limits overtaking opportunities, increasing collision risks of passing vehicles with oncoming traffic. This paper proposes a CAV platoon control strategy of gap opening for guided single HDV overtaking scenarios, which consists of algorithms that determine optimal gap location, gap opening complete time, and gap opening start time, to balance the trade-off between gap prediction accuracy, controller performance, and platoon string stability. The control strategy is evaluated with a simulation, demonstrating its capability to dynamically adapt to real-time traffic conditions and achieve the goals of control accuracy and reliability. The results highlight the feasibility of implementing the control strategy in CAV platooning systems for safe handling of interactions with HDVs in the twolane highway overtaking scenarios.