Urban Navigation System with Multiple Sub-Maps and Multiple Sub-Navigators

Abstract

Deploying an autonomous robot in an urban environment with heterogeneous sub-area is a challenging task that requires different types of navigation and map representation. In a real-world setting, spontaneous change of the environment such as sudden raining or congestion of parts of the navigation area is also a common event that must be handled. This paper presents a real-world navigation system capable of switching among multiple navigation algorithms in a novel manner in order to properly handle the workspace with different characteristics and the challenge of changing condition of the environment. The design of the system is a real-world result from deploying an actual robot in a live system with real-world user and environment.