Intercepting a moving traffic gap while avoiding collision with lead and trail vehicles: gap-related and boundary-related influences on drivers' speed regulations during approach to an intersection.

Using a fixed-base driving simulator, 15 participants actively drove their vehicle across a rural road toward an intersection. Their task was to safely cross the intersection, passing through a gap in the train of incoming traffic. Spatiotemporal task constraints were manipulated by varying the initial conditions (offsets) with respect to the time of arrival of the traffic gap at the intersection.

Intersection crossing considered as intercepting a moving traffic gap: effects of task and environmental constraints.

Safely crossing an intersection requires that drivers actively control their approach to the intersection with respect to characteristics of the flow of incoming traffic. To further our understanding of the perceptual-motor processes involved in this demanding manoeuvre, we designed a driving simulator experiment in which 13 participants actively negotiated intersections by passing through a gap in the train of incoming traffic. Task constraints were manipulated by varying the size of the traffic gap and the initial conditions with respect to the time of arrival of the traffic gap at the intersection.