A terrain inference system, in a host vehicle 2, comprises a controller (6, fig 3) which monitors, e.g. via optical sensor and/or camera 13, a target vehicle 3 to identify an attitude and/or a movement of the target vehicle 3. At least one terrain characteristic, such as incline angle, surface roughness and terrain composition, is inferred in dependence on the identified attitude of the target vehicle 3 and/or the identified movement of the target vehicle 3. The at least one terrain characteristic relates to a region of terrain proximal to the target vehicle 3. The controller (6) is configured to generate a vehicle control parameter, such as a driveline and/or transmission and/or chassis control parameter, or output an alert in dependence on the inferred terrain characteristic. The controller (6) determines a geographical position of the target vehicle 3 and maps the terrain characteristic in dependence on the determined geographic position. Reference is also made to a method of inferring at least one terrain characteristic and a non-transitory computer-readable medium.
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