Connected Vehicle Insights: Fourth Generation Wireless Vehicle and Highway Gateways to the Cloud

Overview

With Fourth Generation cellular (4G), we will see the complete extension of the internet suite of protocols to the wireless environment. 4G likely represents the end of the traditional siloed telecommunications approach that has been the result of decades of investment in single-application “purpose built” wireless technologies (e.g. radio, TV, land mobile, and cellular) and regulatory practice. Current investment patterns in infrastructure provide a strong indication of what will be available and provided in what quantities, quality, and cost beyond 2015 for both terminal devices and network infrastructure. This paper examines how next generation wide-area cellular such as 4G will be able to support vehicular applications, and how transportation infrastructure may mesh with wireless networks. Specifically, it suggests that automotive electronics engineers will need to be cognizant of how application data is treated by 4G Long Term Evolution (LTE) networks, and how innovations such as self-organizing femto-cells, “traffic shaping” and heterogeneous or “vertical roaming” across different radio access technologies may improve the performance of off-board or “cloud” -based vehicular applications Furthermore, the paper suggests that over the long term, vehicles will serve as wireless gateways that manage and collect data a number of devices or sensors deployed in vehicles and highway infrastructure, utilizing 4G cellular as the last-mile wide-area connection to the cloud. 4G will likely manage devices and sensors that utilize a variety of short range radio access technologies such as Wi-Fi that provide the “last yard” connection. Lastly, peer-to-peer short range communications systems will expand. Peer-to-peer systems seek opportunities to communicate directly to other nearby nodes without the need to sluggishly route data traffic to and from cell towers first. Peer-to-Peer technologies include ZigBee, Bluetooth, WiFi-Direct, and FastLinq, and will likely connect consumer devices to vehicle consoles to support a number of telematics applications from mobile devices. Lastly, vehicles will also likely have peer-to-peer wireless systems devoted to safety-critical or highly mobile “spot” communications, based on Dedicates Short Range Communications/Wireless Access for Vehicle Environments (DSRC/WAVE). DSRC/WAVE will support high speed, high integrity local applications such as vehicle-to-vehicle cooperative collision avoidance, or vehicle/infrastructure applications, such as tolling or traffic signal preemption and intersection collision avoidance. Fourth Generation wireless will provide a core gateway to manage a number of systems that will be found in transportation. 4G gateways may be conduits to securely configure and administer peer-to-peer communications systems and other last-yard personal devices or machine-to-machine sensors, as is being contemplated in other industry sectors, such as tele-health, smart energy, and home and industrial automation. Vehicles will likely leverage these personal and machine devices for the computing resources and sensors installed in them, taking advantage of the devices’ ability to add the latest generation of technology without expensive retrofitting. In transportation, these gateways systems and devices will, however, need to be infused with an intelligence that manages personal device interaction with the driver to ensure that they do not represent a distraction to the proper operation of the vehicle. Furthermore, these vehicle gateways , will likely increasingly manage service connections across different wireless access points embedded in transportation infrastructure, such as DSRC/WAVE or Wi-Fi nodes, or even small 4G femto cells that that may be increasingly set up along road corridors.