Representing navigable surface boundaries of lanes in high definition maps for autonomous vehicles

A computer-implemented method comprising:

• receiving a high definition map representation of a geographical region comprising representations of structures in a geographical region comprising representation of a road including of one or more lanes, each lane having a pair of lane boundaries, each lane boundary representing an edge of the lane;
• identifying from the high definition map, one or more structures of the geographical region, each structure located outside of the road;
• for each of the identified structures, identifying a set of points on the structure based on their perpendicular distance from a lane boundary of a road, wherein each point of the set lies outside the road;
• generating a polyline representation through the identified set of points;
• storing in the high definition map representation of the geographical region, the polyline representation as a navigable surface boundary for the road, wherein the navigable surface boundary corresponds to a physical area that lies beyond the road such that a vehicle may safely navigate within the physical area;
• and
• providing the high definition map representation of the geographical region to an autonomous vehicle driving within the geographical region, wherein the vehicle makes a determination whether to drive over a navigable surface outside the road.

A computer system for implementing a navigable surface boundary in a high definition map, the computer system comprising:

• one or more computer processors;
• and
• a computer-readable storage medium containing computer program code that when executed causes one or more processors to:
• receive a high definition map representation of a geographical region comprising three-dimensional representations of structures in a geographical region comprising a representation of a road including one or more lanes, each lane having a pair of lane boundaries, each lane boundary representing an edge of the lane;
• identify from the high definition map, one or more structures of the geographical region, each structure located outside the road;
• for each of the identified structures, identify a set of points on the structure based on their perpendicular distance from a lane boundary of a road, wherein each point of the set lies outside the road;
• generate a polyline representation through the identified set of points;
• store in the high definition map representation of the geographical region, the polyline representation as a navigable surface boundary for the road, wherein the navigable surface boundary corresponds to a physical area that lies outside the road such that a vehicle may safely navigate within the physical area;
• and
• provide the high definition map representation of the geographical region to an autonomous vehicle driving within the geographical region, wherein the vehicle makes a determination whether to drive over a navigable surface outside the road.