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As a consequence of those staggering figures, the FIA Foundation - a UK-registered charity established with an endowment made by the Federation Internationale de l’Automobile, the international association of motoring organisations and governing body of world motor sport – has called for a United Nations taskforce to be established to stem road casualties. Although the “epidemic” is largely associated with road safety in the world’s poorest countries, there is, says the FIA, significant progress that must be made in the UK and across Europe to improve road safety and simultaneously reduce deaths and serious injuries. The European Commission has set a goal of halving the number of road accident victims in the European Union by 2010. Latest figures show that more than 40,000 people are killed – the equivalent of around 14 9/11 disasters a year – and 1.7 million people injured annually across the EU. Contrasting the number of road accidents with the 9/11 outrage may shock. It is meant to because, says the FIA, the technology is already available to assist in the reduction of road accidents, but interested parties – the electronics industry; telecommunications industry; automobile industry; the road infrastructure industry and governments – must work together to bring about the widespread introduction of intelligent transport systems (ITS). The FIA oversees the European New Car Assessment Programme that, the EC says, has advanced road safety by five years. However, FIA president Max Mosley argues:: “The progress that could be achieved by fully using the technology that is available in ITS would be at least two orders of magnitude greater than anything that’s been achieved with Euro NCAP.” To harness ITS – effectively using technology to enable cars to talk to each other and cars to talk to road infrastructure and the environment – Mosley says a clear and sensible programme to incentivise society must be drawn up. He said at an FIA e-mobility conference: “The most effective is going to be some form of fiscal incentive, where the motorist has an incentive to buy the car that has the equipment, and hence the industry, has the incentive to build the car that has the equipment. The people running the infrastructure have the incentive because of the saving of money from reduced congestion and fewer accidents and the other benefits that will flow. The lives that will be saved and the time that will be saved will be enormous.” Mosley says that vehicle manufacturers are leading the safety crusade, but “what is missing is a serious effort to persuade the industry to get the cars to talk to each other and to talk to the infrastructure. The real leap forward will come when cars communicate electronically with one another and with the infrastructure,” he argues. To that end, the European Commission has launched the eSafety Forum (see panel, page 46) that is now focused on the deployment of technologies, systems and solutions to benefit the 375 million road users in Europe. Vehicle manufacturers break safety into two areas – passive and active. They agree that the main focus for more than five decades has been on passive safety – essentially protecting driver and occupants in the event of an accident. However, increasingly, the manufacturers say their focus is turning to active safety – the development of features to enable a driver to avoid having an accident. Anti-lock brake systems (ABS) and Electronic Stability Programme (ESP) have already started to become standard equipment on many new cars. However, those two devices are only a small part of what is known as e-safety. Intelligent speed information, lane departure warning, adaptive cruise control, brake assistance and the use of telematics in vehicle safety, particularly in managing in-car software and alerting drivers to potential faults that could impact on a car’s safety – are all part of the e-safety revolution, which is in its infancy. Erkki Liikanen, European Commissioner for Enterprise and the Information Society, told the FIA conference: “Intelligent integrated safety systems offer major economic opportunities and have the potential to greatly reduce accidents and fatalities on European roads. The real potential for road safety is in the active safety area where IT is essential. We must do everything possible on the passive side, but there are limits to what can be achieved. On the active side, the limits are still far off.” There is no doubt that new systems that use new intelligent solutions for improved road safety can reduce the number of road accidents, particularly in the pre-crash phase when the accident is still avoidable. Almost 95% of accidents are due to the human factor and in almost 75% of accidents, human behaviour is totally to blame. As a consequence, an EC report – “Research on Integrated Safety Systems for Improving Road Safety in Europe” – says: “Drivers represent a significant safety risk and need some form of assistance. This is the area where intelligent integrated safety, including advanced driver assistance systems, offer their greatest potential.” Following on from ABS and stability systems, which help drivers to maintain control of the vehicle, future systems will take into account the driver, the vehicle and the environment around the vehicle. It is for that reason that its is vital that there is a standardisation of technology to guarantee a wide market, higher volumes and lower costs and increased consumer benefits.
The introduction of e-safety will mean a significant increase in the volume of information being delivered to drivers to help them avoid mistakes. But the question remains as to how willing drivers are to accept the level of technology and how much they view it as “Big Brother”. There is no doubt that the travelling public and business transport users can benefit enormously from ITS, but it is not always easy to demonstrate and there needs to be a real process of interaction. For example 70% of people, according to a MORI poll for the FIA, would support an audible in-car warning or a dashboard display that alerts them to the legal speed limit on residential roads and on trunk roads in built-up areas. Using Global Positioning Satellite technology, all cars could be equipped with constantly updating in-car “maps” that warn drivers of the speed limit on any stretch of road in real-time. FIA Foundation director general David Ward says: “Inappropriate speed is a factor in the majority of road crashes. Our survey strongly suggests that the public are open to change and would accept voluntary speed alert systems that constantly warned them of the applicable speed limit. Active safety systems in cars – such as speed alert - have the potential in the future to greatly reduce road traffic injuries. “Public authorities need to seize the agenda by supporting further development of intelligent transport technologies that meet the public’s appetite for safer vehicles.” Vodaphone, one of the major suppliers of telematics information, says the key to the widespread adoption of such technology is the standardisation of platforms across the automotive industry, coupled with competitive pricing and compatible entry cost levels. However, while the motor industry sees the value of telematics and how it can contribute to e-safety, it is not prepared to risk unilateral investment across all models. Instead, it prefers to dip its toe in the water by fitting such technology to luxury cars. It is clear that e-safety technology is available to help reduce road carnage. However, all interested industries and authorities must unite to ensure e-safety is not just available to those who are prepared to pay the cost of entry.
The e-Safety Forum The European Commission-inspired eSafety Forum brings together governments, the motor industry and other interested parties, such as the telecommunications industry, providers of intelligent transport systems, infrastructure operators and public authorities. It has adopted 28 major recommendations that focus on introducing intelligent, integrated road safety systems, which address the interplay between the driver, the vehicle and the road environment.
He says: “Safety is a joint industry/public sector initiative to improve road safety by using new information and communications technologies. “Overall, the objective is to join forces and to build up a European strategy to accelerate the research and development, deployment and use of intelligent, integrated safety systems, including advanced driver assistance systems for increasing road safety in Europe.” Following the formal launch of the eSafety Forum earlier this year, working groups have been established to focus on: • eCall – a new Directive is being compiled that will see all emergency calls being made to a single European emergency call number, 112. The 112 infrastructure would enable more accurate locations and other safety-related information to be gathered from automatic in-vehicle emergency calls • Accident Causation Data – the collation of data on the causes of accidents and the requirement for a framework and methodology to be established to collect more comprehensive data. That will enable effective countermeasures to be established • Human-Machine Interaction – new research on understanding the working environment in vehicles, and the development of clear guidelines for driver interaction with increasingly complex in-vehicle information and communication systems • Business Rationale – the widespread take-up of intelligent road safety systems cannot depend on the private business case alone. All partners need to work together to develop the business case. More working groups are expected to be established to investigate other recommendations. Areas to be investigated include: the setting up of a co-ordinated validation network for operational tests for active safety systems in member states; workload assessment, testing and certification methodology and procedures for in-vehicle working environments, involving interfacing with in-vehicle devices for vehicle control, driver assistance and intelligent integrated road safety; the pursuit of international co-operation in the development of intelligent integrated road safety technologies; and the establishment of a European digital road map database, including speed information and road configuration data Further details available from: www.europa.eu.int/information_society/programmes/esaf ety/index_en.htm |
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