Lofty Ambitions: Europe Sets Goal of Halving Road Deaths By 2010
Advanced Driver Assist System (ADAS) technologies will play a key role in Europe’s effort to cut the number of deaths on its roads in half, according to iSuppli Corp.
The European Union in 2001 experienced 1,300,000 accidents resulting in 1,700,000 injuries and 40,000 deaths. Based on these numbers, and likely surprised by their magnitude despite a growing level of confidence in automotive safety, the European Union decided to set itself a simple yet lofty goal of halving the number of road deaths by 2010.
The European Union and the European Commission (EC) have been active in proposing new initiatives to help accomplish its goal. Involving everyone from national governments to public authorities and private enterprises, the EC sought to bring together the individual stakeholders in order to share ideas and best practices, instill a sense of shared responsibility, and ultimately save as many as 25,000 European lives per year.
Many of these initiatives and discussions involve ADAS technologies, which include ultrasonic and camera park assist, adaptive cruise control, lane departure warning and blind-spot detection systems.
European Road Safety Charter
First among these initiatives is the European Road Safety Charter. The charter is the largest existing road safety platform, encompassing all 27 E.U. member states and including more than 1,100 public authorities and private entities as signatories. Established by the EC Directorate-General of Energy and Transport, it invites public and private organizations to specifically and actively contribute to the realization of Europe’s goal to halve road deaths by the year 2010.
The European Road Safety Charter focuses on three areas of relevance: vehicles, infrastructure and road users. First, and most closely tied to the automotive and ADAS industries, is raising safety levels in vehicles. The Charter encourages this by measuring and publishing test results for new vehicles through the Euro New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) safety tests and by encouraging the adoption of proven safety technologies.
Unfortunately, many safety technologies such as adaptive cruise control and blind-spot detection systems have not had the luxury of time and widespread availability to sufficiently prove they can reduce accidents or deaths. As a result, many of these new ADAS solutions are relegated to research while the tried-and-true technologies such as seat belts and airbags find their way to the legislative front.
The other two areas of focus in the Charter concern road users and infrastructure. While the Charter simply encourages road users to improve their behavior through education, awareness campaigns and stricter enforcement of existing legislation, it also asks that safety be considered in the pre-design phase of infrastructure and new roads. While other E.U. efforts focus specifically on the development of Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS), the consideration of safety so early in the construction process could create opportunities for ITS integration from the ground up and could also lead to more navigation-enabled ADAS systems that benefit from mindfully-designed roadways.
Currently, the European Road Safety Charter is pursuing a requirement for seat belt reminders in passenger vehicles and now requires that all heavy goods vehicles be equipped with blind-spot mirrors on the passenger side to help protect bikers and pedestrians. The requirement of these side-object detection systems by the EC acknowledges the importance of blind-spot safety and could lead to the consideration of radar- and camera-based detection and recognition systems in the future.
The EC also has nominated driver monitoring, collision avoidance and mitigation, pedestrian protection, and visibility systems such as night vision as potential candidates for worthwhile research.
Intelligent Car Initiative
Formed in February 2006, the EC’s Intelligent Car Initiative was conceived to advance the use of intelligent technologies in automobiles to help make them smarter, safer and cleaner. Naturally this initiative works side by side with the Charter to help achieve Europe’s goal, although it was not designed specifically for that purpose. The Initiative itself includes three complimentary pillars: the eSafety Forum, an awareness-raising group for consumer information and intelligent communication technology research.
The first pillar of the Intelligent Car Initiative is the eSafety Forum, which aims to accelerate the development and deployment of intelligent information and communication technologies by building consensus among industry stakeholders. It also serves as the liaison with other groups such as the European Road Safety Action Program as well as with decision makers in the European government.
Furthermore, eSafety works closely with the second pillar, serving as an important awareness tool to inform the public. Including the Choose ESC! and 112 campaigns, it disseminates information and hosts demonstrations of electronic stability control and the single European-wide emergency number, an important step in gaining public awareness, understanding and acceptance of new technologies and protocols designed to keep citizens safe.
The third pillar of the Intelligent Car Initiative focuses on research in the V2X communications field and also incorporates real-time traffic information as a driver aid in both safety and environmental friendliness. Many OEMs and industry suppliers also have come together to explore the possibilities of intelligent communications technologies with varying degrees of participation from the European community.These projects aim to understand the full influence these systems have on drivers and could include efforts to integrate V2X communications with location-aware ADAS technologies.
The latest research agenda from the eSafety Forum included insight into ADAS technologies including collision avoidance. As a directive for future research and development, the results indicate that current collision mitigation systems should evolve into full collision avoidance systems with a focus on reducing costs for deployment in small and medium-sized cars, although it provides no specific action to reach that goal. Its plan for future research extends the timeline to 2020, hoping that infrastructures will be evolved enough to integrate the vehicle’s safety systems with advanced communications infrastructures, such as vehicle-to-infrastructure or Vehicle-to-Vehicle links (V2X).
Conclusion
Vehicle safety certainly has improved since the introduction of the European Road Safety Charter in 2001. An average car 10 years ago was awarded two stars for occupant protection by the Euro NCAP compared with four or five stars awarded to 90 percent of new cars today. Yet, while average safety levels have risen and despite of the efforts of the European Road Safety Charter and Intelligent Car Initiative, the European Union is not likely to reach its goal of halving road deaths until 2017.
So while the initiatives created and progress made has been admirable, the tangible results have been less than stellar overall. Estimates from December 2008 by the EC Directorate-General of Energy and Transport are even more troubling: it suggests that while a few European countries have successfully lowered the number of road deaths by 40 percent to 50 percent, some nations have improved only by a few percentage points, with Bulgaria and Romania actually seeing 5 percent and 22 percent increases in road fatalities since 2001, respectively. It seems the gap between some Western and Eastern European nations is widening.
Overall, estimates show that a 27 percent decrease in road deaths has been achieved as of 2008, which is certainly a noteworthy achievement on its own. But whether it is extra measures that need to be introduced or just closer adherence to those already put forth, statistical estimates show that a significant improvement must be made within the European Union to meet its goal of halving road deaths by 2010.
Unfortunately, between the multi-phase E.U. co-decision process, the lengthy automotive product life cycle, and the fact that the only safety system currently on mandate is electronic stability control—and arriving only in 2011 in its earliest form—it seems more and more unlikely that the European Union will succeed in halving road deaths by 2010.
The European Union in 2001 experienced 1,300,000 accidents resulting in 1,700,000 injuries and 40,000 deaths. Based on these numbers, and likely surprised by their magnitude despite a growing level of confidence in automotive safety, the European Union decided to set itself a simple yet lofty goal of halving the number of road deaths by 2010.
The European Union and the European Commission (EC) have been active in proposing new initiatives to help accomplish its goal. Involving everyone from national governments to public authorities and private enterprises, the EC sought to bring together the individual stakeholders in order to share ideas and best practices, instill a sense of shared responsibility, and ultimately save as many as 25,000 European lives per year.
Many of these initiatives and discussions involve ADAS technologies, which include ultrasonic and camera park assist, adaptive cruise control, lane departure warning and blind-spot detection systems.
European Road Safety Charter
First among these initiatives is the European Road Safety Charter. The charter is the largest existing road safety platform, encompassing all 27 E.U. member states and including more than 1,100 public authorities and private entities as signatories. Established by the EC Directorate-General of Energy and Transport, it invites public and private organizations to specifically and actively contribute to the realization of Europe’s goal to halve road deaths by the year 2010.
The European Road Safety Charter focuses on three areas of relevance: vehicles, infrastructure and road users. First, and most closely tied to the automotive and ADAS industries, is raising safety levels in vehicles. The Charter encourages this by measuring and publishing test results for new vehicles through the Euro New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) safety tests and by encouraging the adoption of proven safety technologies.
Unfortunately, many safety technologies such as adaptive cruise control and blind-spot detection systems have not had the luxury of time and widespread availability to sufficiently prove they can reduce accidents or deaths. As a result, many of these new ADAS solutions are relegated to research while the tried-and-true technologies such as seat belts and airbags find their way to the legislative front.
The other two areas of focus in the Charter concern road users and infrastructure. While the Charter simply encourages road users to improve their behavior through education, awareness campaigns and stricter enforcement of existing legislation, it also asks that safety be considered in the pre-design phase of infrastructure and new roads. While other E.U. efforts focus specifically on the development of Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS), the consideration of safety so early in the construction process could create opportunities for ITS integration from the ground up and could also lead to more navigation-enabled ADAS systems that benefit from mindfully-designed roadways.
Currently, the European Road Safety Charter is pursuing a requirement for seat belt reminders in passenger vehicles and now requires that all heavy goods vehicles be equipped with blind-spot mirrors on the passenger side to help protect bikers and pedestrians. The requirement of these side-object detection systems by the EC acknowledges the importance of blind-spot safety and could lead to the consideration of radar- and camera-based detection and recognition systems in the future.
The EC also has nominated driver monitoring, collision avoidance and mitigation, pedestrian protection, and visibility systems such as night vision as potential candidates for worthwhile research.
Intelligent Car Initiative
Formed in February 2006, the EC’s Intelligent Car Initiative was conceived to advance the use of intelligent technologies in automobiles to help make them smarter, safer and cleaner. Naturally this initiative works side by side with the Charter to help achieve Europe’s goal, although it was not designed specifically for that purpose. The Initiative itself includes three complimentary pillars: the eSafety Forum, an awareness-raising group for consumer information and intelligent communication technology research.
The first pillar of the Intelligent Car Initiative is the eSafety Forum, which aims to accelerate the development and deployment of intelligent information and communication technologies by building consensus among industry stakeholders. It also serves as the liaison with other groups such as the European Road Safety Action Program as well as with decision makers in the European government.
Furthermore, eSafety works closely with the second pillar, serving as an important awareness tool to inform the public. Including the Choose ESC! and 112 campaigns, it disseminates information and hosts demonstrations of electronic stability control and the single European-wide emergency number, an important step in gaining public awareness, understanding and acceptance of new technologies and protocols designed to keep citizens safe.
The third pillar of the Intelligent Car Initiative focuses on research in the V2X communications field and also incorporates real-time traffic information as a driver aid in both safety and environmental friendliness. Many OEMs and industry suppliers also have come together to explore the possibilities of intelligent communications technologies with varying degrees of participation from the European community.These projects aim to understand the full influence these systems have on drivers and could include efforts to integrate V2X communications with location-aware ADAS technologies.
The latest research agenda from the eSafety Forum included insight into ADAS technologies including collision avoidance. As a directive for future research and development, the results indicate that current collision mitigation systems should evolve into full collision avoidance systems with a focus on reducing costs for deployment in small and medium-sized cars, although it provides no specific action to reach that goal. Its plan for future research extends the timeline to 2020, hoping that infrastructures will be evolved enough to integrate the vehicle’s safety systems with advanced communications infrastructures, such as vehicle-to-infrastructure or Vehicle-to-Vehicle links (V2X).
Conclusion
Vehicle safety certainly has improved since the introduction of the European Road Safety Charter in 2001. An average car 10 years ago was awarded two stars for occupant protection by the Euro NCAP compared with four or five stars awarded to 90 percent of new cars today. Yet, while average safety levels have risen and despite of the efforts of the European Road Safety Charter and Intelligent Car Initiative, the European Union is not likely to reach its goal of halving road deaths until 2017.
So while the initiatives created and progress made has been admirable, the tangible results have been less than stellar overall. Estimates from December 2008 by the EC Directorate-General of Energy and Transport are even more troubling: it suggests that while a few European countries have successfully lowered the number of road deaths by 40 percent to 50 percent, some nations have improved only by a few percentage points, with Bulgaria and Romania actually seeing 5 percent and 22 percent increases in road fatalities since 2001, respectively. It seems the gap between some Western and Eastern European nations is widening.
Overall, estimates show that a 27 percent decrease in road deaths has been achieved as of 2008, which is certainly a noteworthy achievement on its own. But whether it is extra measures that need to be introduced or just closer adherence to those already put forth, statistical estimates show that a significant improvement must be made within the European Union to meet its goal of halving road deaths by 2010.
Unfortunately, between the multi-phase E.U. co-decision process, the lengthy automotive product life cycle, and the fact that the only safety system currently on mandate is electronic stability control—and arriving only in 2011 in its earliest form—it seems more and more unlikely that the European Union will succeed in halving road deaths by 2010.
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