Driving assistance device and driving assistance method

A driving assistance method utilized by a driving assistance device that uses a laser radar mounted to a moving body, and that assists traveling of said moving body, comprising the steps of:

• acquiring information about the surroundings of said moving body acquired by using light emitted from said laser radar, traffic mirror information that includes position information for a traffic mirror installed on a road, and position information for said moving body;
• specifying a positional relationship between said moving body and said traffic mirror, on the basis of said traffic mirror information and said position information for said moving body acquired in said acquiring step;
• and
• extracting information about the surroundings acquired via said traffic mirror from among information about the surroundings of said moving body acquired by said acquiring step, on the basis of said positional relationship, the information about the surroundings acquired via said traffic mirror being obtained using a part of light emitted from said laser radar and returning to the laser radar via said traffic mirror after reflection off an object.

A driving assistance device comprising:

• a first acquisition unit that acquires information about the surroundings of a moving body by using a laser radar mounted to the moving body;
• a second acquisition unit that acquires traffic mirror information that includes position information for a traffic mirror installed on a road;
• a third acquisition unit that acquires position information for said moving body;
• and
• a calculation unit that, i) on the basis of the results of acquisition by using said second acquisition unit and by using said third acquisition unit, specifies a positional relationship between said moving body and said traffic mirror, and ii) from results of acquisition from said first acquisition unit, the calculation unit calculates information of a position of an object irradiated by light emitted by said laser radar, the information of the position of the object being calculated using a part of the light being emitted from said laser radar and returning to the laser radar after being reflected by said traffic mirror and the object.