Opportunistic Use of In-Vehicle Wireless Networks for Vulnerable Road User Interaction

• Main Authors: d'Orey, Pedro M., Santos, Pedro M., Pintor, Jose, Aguiar, Ana
• Format: Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Subjects: Antenna measurements; Antenna radiation patterns; Automobiles; Bicycles; IEEE 802.11 Standard; Performance evaluation; Wireless communication
• ISSN: 2642-7214
• DOI: 10.1109/IVS.2019.8813865

In-vehicle wireless networks (e.g., Wi-Fi, Bluetooth) are experiencing a faster market penetration than dedicated V2V technologies and are compatible with non-V2X devices. In this paper, we assess whether commodity in-vehicle networks can leverage opportunistic V2X communication to nodes outside of the vehicle, particularly with Vulnerable Road Users. We characterize the radiation pattern and performance of communication links in the 2.4 GHz band between in-car wireless networks and a wireless-enabled bicycle in two representative interaction scenarios (i.e. parallel and perpendicular vehicle-VRU trajectories) using both production hardware (i.e. built-in WiFi hotspot) and dedicated measurement equipment. Empirical results show that (i) the signal propagation to the outside of the vehicle is strongly affected (up to 20 dB) by the vehicle elements (e.g. pillars) and by the placement of the wireless system inside the car, and (ii) the communication performance (in terms of RSSI, IRT, Throughput) is also impaired by the spatial arrangement of vehicle and VRU, and other time-varying phenomena (e.g., human body and bicycle shadowing). We conclude that the in-car system performance allows supporting a wide range of safety and infotainment applications (e.g., IRT under 300 ms) even at large TX-RX distances, and that the placement of an in-car wireless system should be tailored according to the target application.