US Patent 11565700 Vehicle control device and vehicle control method

A lane change control unit restricts an automatic lane change in the case of predicting that a user's own vehicle after having made the automatic lane change will be adjacent to another vehicle that exists inside of a third lane or on a third lane dividing line, and executes the automatic lane change without restriction in the case of predicting that the user's own vehicle after having made the automatic lane change will be adjacent to another vehicle that exists inside a fourth lane or inside of a road shoulder.