Model predictive parking control for nonholonomic vehicles using time-state control form

In this study, a model predictive control (MPC) for nonholonomic vehicles with steering and travel range constraints is proposed and applied to the parking problem. We transformed the nonlinear dynamics into two linear subsystems using time-state control form (TSCF) where we suppress the computational effort of MPC with reduced order dynamics. Both steering and travel range constraints can be considered using 1st order approximation with enough accuracy. The parking problem for nonholonomic vehicles needs a switching movement where the switching point is automatically optimized. The performance of the proposed method is verified through actual vehicle experiments on the parking problem in narrow garage.