Vehicle control device and vehicle control method

Abstract

A vehicle control device includes an external environment recognition unit that recognizes a situation of a surrounding periphery of a user's own vehicle, and a lane change control unit that executes an automatic lane change by controlling a travel speed and steering of the user's own vehicle based on a recognition result of the external environment recognition unit. The automatic lane change includes a first lane change (third mode) which is executed regardless of an intention of a driver, and a second lane change (first mode) which is executed in accordance with the intention of the driver. In the case that a request to make the second lane change is detected during execution of the first lane change, the lane change control unit switches the automatic lane change to be executed from the first lane change to the second lane change.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.