Intelligent reflective vest with implementation of ETSI VAM protocol : Development and testing of an embedded system for the protection of Vulnerable Road Users

Abstract: This master thesis presents a wearable, ETSI-compliant system for protecting Vulnerable Road Users (VRUs). The study explores the current ETSI VAM parameters, which are too similar to vehicle pa- rameters and may react differently to different types of VRUs, gen- erating an excessive or insufficient number of VAMs, and potentially jeopardizing VRU safety.  The thesis aims to assess the appropriateness of the parameters, examine their impact on awareness metrics (i.e., how often VRUs up- date their neighbours), and evaluate their effect on data and energy consumption.  By modifying the sampling time (from 0.1 s to 1.0 s), simulations demonstrate improved reliability, particularly regarding Inter-Packet Gaps (IPGs), with lower and more stable values in all scenarios. How- ever, congestion issues persist at higher densities, requiring further re- search. The proposed sampling parameter offers significant savings, generating 64% fewer messages in the pedestrian case and 78% fewer in the bicycle case. This leads to a reduction in energy consumption due to less frequent transmissions. Overall, this research contributes to developing an efficient VRU protection system while addressing challenges associated with parameter optimization and congestion problems.