Patent ID: 7409279

Claim:
A lane departure prevention apparatus comprising: a system operating-switch to selectively turn the lane departure prevention apparatus between an OFF position corresponding to a non-operating state, in which lane departure avoidance of a host vehicle will not be performed even though the host vehicle is departing from a driving lane, and an ON position corresponding to an operable state in which lane departure avoidance is performed by a braking control operation for avoiding lane departure of the host vehicle from the driving lane when the host vehicle is tending to depart from the driving lane, based on a driver's selection of the system operating-switch; a driver condition detection section configured to detect that a driver condition tending to indicate a driver may not perceive that the host vehicle is tending toward lane departure; and a lane departure avoidance control section configured to forcibly switch from the non-operating state to the operable state, when the non-operating state is selected by the system operating-switch being in the OFF position and when the driver condition detection section detects that the driver condition is tending to indicate that the driver may not perceive that the host vehicle is tending toward lane departure.