Road recognition in urban environment

The position estimation of a vehicle relative to the lane and the recogniti on of the road topography are important tasks for vision-based driver assis tance in urban traffic. Lane structures such as markings, curbs, crosswalks and stop lines are detected in a polygonal edge image. Data driven global detection and fast, local model-based tracking are integrated in the presen ted lane recognition system that reduces the computational effort and keeps up with the dynamic urban environment. Stereo vision is integrated to impr ove robustness in cluttered scenarios and to reliably estimate horizontal a nd vertical geometry and motion. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.