Patent ID: 11859989
Assignee: WAYMO LLC
Field: Transport (Mechanical engineering)
Classification: CPC B  G | IPC B  G

Claim 14:
15. A vehicle configured to operate in an autonomous driving mode, the vehicle comprising:
a perception system including one or more sensors, the one or more sensors being configured to obtain sensor data associated with objects in an external environment of the vehicle, the external environment including a roadway;
a driving system including a steering subsystem, an acceleration subsystem and a deceleration subsystem to control driving of the vehicle;
a positioning system configured to determine a current position of the vehicle; and
a control system including one or more processors, the control system operatively coupled to the driving system, the perception system and the positioning system, the control system being configured to:
receive sensor data obtained from the perception system;
obtain, based on the received sensor data, a clearance offset to a side of the roadway;
apply a field of view restriction to the clearance offset to obtain a final offset, the field of view restriction corresponding to one or more occluded areas along the side of the roadway with respect to the perception system;
calculate a cost for each pullover location of a set of possible pullover locations based on the final offset;
compare the cost for each pullover location against a baseline set of costs that does not take into account the field of view restriction;
select, based on the comparison, a pullover location along the roadway; and
cause the driving system of the vehicle to perform a pullover maneuver in the autonomous driving mode according to the selected pullover location.