Remotely operating vehicles utilizes the benefits of vehicle automation when fully automated driving is not yet possible. A human operator ensures safety and availability from afar and supports the vehicle automation when its capabilities are exceeded. The remote operator thus fulfills the legal requirements in Germany as a Technical Supervisor to operate highly automated vehicles at SAE 4. To integrate the remote operator into the automated driving system, a novel user-centered human-machine interface (HMI) for remote assistance workplaces was developed and initially evaluated. The insights gained in this process were incorporated into the design of a workplace prototype for remote assistance. This prototype was now tested in the study reported here by 34 participants meeting the professional background criteria for the role of Technical Supervisor according to the German law by using typical remote assistance scenarios created in a simulation environment. Even under elevated cognitive load induced by simultaneously engaging in a secondary task, participants were able to obtain sufficient situation awareness and quickly resolve the scenarios. The HMI also yielded favorable usability and acceptance ratings. The results of the study inform the iterative workplace development and further research on the remote assistance of highly automated vehicles.

翻译：远程操控车辆利用了在完全自动驾驶尚不可行时车辆自动化的优势。人类操作员从远处保障安全与可用性，并在车辆自动化能力不足时提供支持。因此，远程操作员在德国满足了作为技术监督员运营SAE 4级高度自动化车辆的法律要求。为将远程操作员集成至自动驾驶系统，我们开发并初步评估了一种面向远程辅助工作站的创新用户中心型人机交互界面（HMI）。在此过程中获得的洞见被应用于远程辅助工作站原型的设计。本研究报告中，我们采用模拟环境中创建的典型远程辅助场景，对34名符合德国法律规定的技术监督员职业背景标准的参与者进行了测试。即使在因同时执行次要任务而导致认知负荷升高的情况下，参与者仍能获得足够的态势感知能力并快速解决场景问题。该HMI还获得了良好的可用性与接受度评分。本研究结果为工作站的迭代开发及高度自动化车辆远程辅助的进一步研究提供了依据。