Crash me if you can

Richard Blackburn of the Sydney Morning Herald discusses forthcoming automotive technologies that may bring us closer to "the world's first uncrashable cars". Some of the advanced technologies available now or soon should help drivers to remain stability, stay in lane, avoid low-speed rear-end collisions. Looking further ahead, your car could tell you whether it's safe to overtake or whether you're approaching a corner too fast, help you decide if you have enough time to get across an intersection before the oncoming traffic arrives. You car could even drive itself in a “platoon” formation on the freeway, and automatically avoid pedestrians.

Toyota's product planning manager, Peter Evans, is cautious about predicting dramatic reductions in the road toll in the next decade: you can build an intelligent car but developing intelligent roads and drivers is more of a challenge. "It's that old saying about the nut behind the wheel being the most unreliable part of the car," he says.

The SMH points to intelligent speed adaptation technology being considered by the New South Wales Government in Australia. The technology relies on satellite-linked devices which can read road signs and alert the driver if he or she is speeding. The technology has the potential to actively decrease the flow of fuel to the engine if a car is speeding. Unlike some of the devices being used in the NSW Government trial, a BMW system provides information only. It doesn't intervene to slow the car down. The responsibility for that remains with the driver. 

Meanwhile in Japan, car companies including Toyota and Nissan are working with the Government to develop intelligent freeways. Toyota is about to debut technology that will feed real-time traffic information from roadside sensors into a car's cabin. The technology has the potential to stop minor collisions becoming deadly pile-ups.  

Interested readers should view the whole article. Source: Sydney Morning Herald. 25 September 2009. tinyurl.com/yea4ma3

Pedestrian friendly cars within sight

According to the Sydney Morning Herald, hundreds of lives could be saved if new pedestrian avoidance technology filters its way in to mainstream cars in the near future. Volvo will soon introduce a car that can automatically apply maximum braking to avoid hitting a pedestrian or reduce injuries. The “Collision Warning with Full Auto Brake and Pedestrian Detection” will arrive in the new S60 in 2010. 

Using a radar and a camera, it can react within 50ms, avoid an impact below 25km/h and reduce speed by 25km/h (at higher speeds). Volvo says its system, also being developed by Audi and Mercedes-Benz, has the potential to reduce injury risk to pedestrians by 83 per cent. 

Software was ‘trained’ after analysing 530,000 kilometres of real world driving to recognise people of all shapes and sizes in thousands of scenarios and even take in to account prams and special clothes. Applying the brakes before a collision is intended to help account for the inattention, which Volvo says contributes to 93 per cent of crashes. “In 47 per cent of crashes the driver doesn’t do anything [brake or steer] before the collision”, said Volvo manager of active safety functions Jonas Tisell.

The SMH warns the hundreds of thousands of kangaroos killed on Australian roads each year not to get too excited. Tisell noted that “The next step is handling animals. But the difficulty with animals is that they are shaped by evolution not to be seen.” Pedestrians will still need their wits about them too. The system may not detect a person stepping out from behind a bus or truck and is unable to detect pedestrians at night. The system is as an iterative step in safety improvement.

The Volvo pedestrian detection system is part of a trend towards crash avoidance rather than vehicle occupant protection. Mercedes-Benz is working on an innovative anchor-like metal and rubber-faced airbag that deploys beneath the car on to the road surface when it detects a collision is imminent. Source: Sydney Morning Herald, 18 September 2009. tinyurl.com/yfk6vuy

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Under 25's ditch maps for sat-nav

The Telegraph reports that a generational gap may be developing with older drivers sticking with printed road maps while under 25 rely on the electronic systems to navigate the roads. A survey by Autonational Rescue found that three in 10 motorists checked a road map first to double check their location, but only one in 10 of under-25s did this. It also found that one in three prefer to print a route from the internet and take it with them, although almost one in 10 of these drivers found internet instructions can sometimes take them miles out of their way.

Out of the satnav motorists, more than one in 10 said the machines took them on a long-winded route. Four fifths are happy with the system. "It seems we have a generational satnav age gap," said Ronan Hart, Autonational's marketing manager. But Hart reckons that sat-nav is making younger drivers lazier and less geographically aware.

Also, last year it was reported that satellite navigation systems were blamed for causing around 300,000 people to crash in Britain, while a further 1.5 million admitted performing sudden direction changes because they were following the devices' directions.

Andrew Howard, head of road safety at the AA noted that, "When you're driving a car, a satnav is a darn site easier and safer to use than a roadmap, but when sitting in the living room plotting what to do a roadmap is easier to use... The question is whether they are supplementary or complementary." Source: The Telegraph, 14 September 2009. tinyurl.com/y99nhne

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Human factors concerns as Samoan drivers switch to the left-hand side

On 7 September, drivers in Samoa in the Pacific switched from driving on the right-hand side of the road to the left. The change was pitched as economically beneficial by the Government, allowing tens of thousands of expatriate Samoans living in New Zealand and Australia to send used cars to their families back home, making cars will cheaper and more available in rural areas.

There are fewer than 20,000 vehicles on Samoa's roads, and about 4,000 are currently right-hand drive. The changeover met with fierce opposition. Critics claimed that the government has failed to consult the public on the change or conduct any feasibility studies. In April last year an estimated 18,000 people - about 10% of Samoa's population - demonstrated against the change. 

Opponents argued that confused drivers will forget which lane to pull into and pedestrians will look the wrong way. "Cars are going to crash, people are going to die - not to mention the huge expense to our country," said lawyer Tole'afoa Solomona Toa'iloa, who  headed a legal challenge in the Supreme Court. Traffic analysts testifying in court agreed that more accidents were likely to occur. But the Supreme Court rejected the legal challenge. Local bus owners are furious about having to either buy new vehicles or convert their old ones so passengers don't have to step off into the middle of the road. 

New signs directing drivers to keep left have been removed, and directional arrows on the road have been painted over to point the wrong way. But critics insist not enough has been done to prepare drivers. Samoa's Chamber of Commerce estimates that it will cost at least $300m (£185m) in direct and indirect costs. Source: BBC, 6 September 2009. tinyurl.com/ljyo42

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Text-driving video "one of the best public information films ever"

The dangers of text-driving have been highlighted around the world thanks to a road safety film made by police in Gwent, South Wales. The video has become a global hit and been described as one of the best public information films ever. In the film, a fictional 17-year-old is distracted for a few seconds while driving with two friends. She causes a crash which kills her friends, and another couple.

The `viral video’ has reached web users across the world, including India and South America and has over 2 million hits on You Tube. It has also featured on CNN, discussed in Time magazine, and described by an advertiser as possibly one of the most powerful public information films ever made.

The 30-minute film is to be shown on BBC Wales in October. The force is also working on a schools learning pack. Gwent’s Chief Constable Mick Giannasi said: "I am astonished but encouraged by the way news of the film had spread" and has had suggestions that it should be used as part of the theory test for young drivers. The film was made for just "a few thousand pounds" by the force using amateur actors. The force had intended to make a film about joyriders but were told by youngsters from nearby Tredegar Comprehensive School that texting is more dangerous. The film director Peter Watkin-Hughes said: "If we can get one person to change their behaviour then it is worthwhile." Source: Telegraph, 4 September 2009. tinyurl.com/nvy59m

Hands-free car phones no safe option

The Sydney Morning Herald reports on several studies that highlight the dangers of driving while using hands-free car phones. A long-term study conducted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in the US in 2003, but only recently reported in the New York Times, uncovered “negligible differences in safety relevant behaviour and performance between using a hand-held and hands-free communications devices while driving from the standpoint of cognitive distraction”. Advice from authorities is conflicting. In Australia, the NSW Roads and Traffic Authority urges drivers to keep their mobile conversations short and to avoid “complex or emotional” topics, but the the NRMA motoring organisation goes a step further, advising drivers who want to make or receive a call or send a text, to pull over before using their mobiles. “Even when you’re on a mobile hands-free, you are diverting your attention from driving and increase the risk of having a crash," NRMA Insurance spokesman John Hallal said.

In 2005, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety undertook a study to cross-match traffic accidents with phone billing data. The findings indicated a four-fold increase in injury crash risk from the use of mobile phones, consistent across male and female drivers, older and younger drivers, and hand-held and hands-free phones.

Another study by Griffith University in 2004 revealed that it was not only hand-held mobiles that caused problems, and the interference from talking to someone not in same context was problematic. Russell White, a driving expert who helped to conduct the 2004 study, said: “We discovered that distraction didn’t come from the type of conversation... It was the factor of having the chat, during which we saw changes in driving performance in terms of perception, awareness and also vehicle control... We found they braked later and cornered harder when having telephone conversation as opposed to when there were no distractions.” He said the key problem was the internal process of having a phone call, which takes them out of their current situation.

In spite of the mounting evidence, equipment manufacturers continue to market hands-free systems as safe alternatives to hand-held phones. “Hands-free car kits allow the convenient and safe use of your mobile phone so you can maximise down time while driving,” Telstra says on its website.

But an outright ban on hands-free dialling will not solve existing safety concerns said Thilo Koslowski, Gartner’s car industry analyst: “What we need are more studies to examine the cognitive load of talking on a mobile phone. I think ultimately the automobile industry will find the answer in sophisticated communication systems that can interact with driving data,” he said. Source: Sydney Morning Herald, 29 July 2009. tinyurl.com/n9dydo

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Trust in automation lands lorry in ditch

In another case of automation-induced complacency, a articulated lorry driver ended up in a ditch in the tuny Cotswald village of Syde. "Then they look at their sat-nav and potter off down these lanes, which are so narrow, and all of a sudden this happens," according to a local councillor. Gloucestershire County Council is running a trial scheme to ban HGVs from country lanes around the Cotswolds, including Syde. Source: Telegraph. http://tinyurl.com/detn3

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