Reports



INTELLIGENT TRANSPORTATION SYSTEMS AND ROAD SAFETY


Executive Summary


Full report (.pdf format)

Introduction

The primary purpose of this review is to provide advice for European policymakers on which Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) should be encouraged and developed and which should be discouraged and even prevented from a road safety point of view. The secondary target group is the research community, industrial representatives, road user and other interested organisations. Public as well as private ITS is considered.

The main reason for carrying out this review is to analyse in which ways ITS may contribute to reducing the unacceptably high human and economic toll from road crashes within the EU. In absolute figures over 42,500 people (800 every week) are killed on EU roads and more than 3.5 million persons are injured (including underreporting) each year. Expressed in other ways about 1 in 80 European citizens will end their lives on average 40 years too early and about 1 in 3 European citizens will need hospital treatment during their lifetime due to road crashes. The estimated costs of all these crashes within the EU is over 160 billion euro ¾ around twice the EU budget and close to 1 per cent of GDP ¾ an almost incredible figure.

Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) are based on intelligence placed at the roadside and in the vehicle. By means of communication between these systems and road users (primarily drivers), various road safety problems can be solved more easily. These can be societal problems such as speed adaptation as well as individual problems such as a call for help in an emergency. So far ITS has not lived up to its expectations concerning road safety. And it is important to point out that such a positive impact does not come by itself but needs careful analysis, planning and monitoring. The primary questions are "How can the safety of ITS be checked before it comes on the market? What is the appropriate process for such quality control? This is where the European Union has a key role.

Road safety has, until lately, been a mere by-product in ITS development and certainly not a central aspect of design. Today, there is sufficient evidence to suggest that the development and application of ITS should not be left entirely to market forces, as the market does not necessarily select the alternative most beneficial to safety. Manufacturers should be helped with design, development, and implementation issues, in order to re-establish the correct balance between safety and other ITS objectives, and to prevent further uncontrolled development. What might be allowable in the struggle for a common video standard is certainly not acceptable when it comes to saving lives.

It is becoming more and more clear that the introduction of various IT functions will not just change some of our tasks as road users. Widespread implementation of IT functions will completely revolutionise our lives. ITS may radically modify transport systems, particularly the extent to which they may change the role and the behaviour of the driver. It is presently impossible to predict all the ways in which our lives and behaviour as road users will be changed. In fact the response of road users to ITS applications, as they are introduced, is the most critical factor for the safety effects of ITS.

There are two ways to improve road safety by means of ITS: systems that influence safety in a direct way and systems that influence safety in an indirect way. Examples of promising direct systems are, for example, incident detection and warning systems using variable message signs, violation detection and enforcement systems, electronic licences, in-vehicle black boxes (crash recorders), variable speed limits, intelligent speed adaptation. Examples of indirect systems are those that change the exposure or mode of traffic, debiting systems, systems giving priority to public transport.

Another way of analysing the potential safety effects of ITS applications, which is the method used in this report, is to distinguish between three main variables that determine road safety levels in terms of health consequences: exposure in traffic, risk of a crash given the exposure, consequence of the crash. ITS has the potential to improve safety along each one of these three dimensions:

  • It is possible and feasible now to influence or even control traffic exposure by means of ITS.
  • It will be possible to reduce the probability of crashes, to prevent crashes by means of ITS.
  • It will be possible to reduce the injury consequences of crashes by means of ITS.

ITS’ effect on safety through changed exposure.

There are a wide range of ITS applications addressing traffic volume and thus exposure. Practical experience as well as research results show that it is possible to reduce exposure by these means.

Many of these applications will be introduced as a matter of course, as safety objectives go hand in hand with other traffic policy goals such as energy consumption and environment. A number of applications include benefits for drivers in terms of improved information and other services. That will facilitate the introduction of systems such as:

  • electronic driver licences
  • road pricing schemes

  • travel planners

  • route guidance
  • freight and fleet management

One of the ITS applications described in this report has outstanding potential in terms of crash savings. That is the electronic driver licence, which directly addresses the driver’s authorisation and ability to drive the vehicle.

 

ITS’ effects on safety through reduced crash risk.

A number of systems exist with high safety potential in reducing crash risk. Some of them are of a very general character:

  • intelligent speed adaptation
  • electronic driving licence

On motorways, the most safety beneficial systems have the potential to reduce injuries and fatalities by about 10–15 per cent. These systems are:

  • motorway control systems
  • driver and vehicle monitoring systems
  • collision avoidance systems
  • incident management
  • automated speed enforcement

On other rural roads, current systems with the potential to reduce injuries and deaths by more than 10 per cent are fewer than on motorways, but they are more effective - intelligent speed adaptation has a 30 per cent and automated speed enforcement a 20 per cent injury reduction potential. Collision avoidance systems which work perfectly would, of course, have a very high potential. However, there are considerable problems in designing collision avoidance systems to work perfectly. The ITS systems with the highest safety potential are:

  • collision avoidance
  • automated speed enforcement
  • speed control systems with variable speed limits
  • driver and vehicle monitoring systems

In urban areas, systems with most safety potential (injury reduction of 30 per cent when fully implemented) are:

  • collision avoidance

  • intelligent speed adaptation
  • urban traffic control

Much ITS development has so far concentrated on motorways, including the development of safety relevant ITS. The safety problems, however, concentrate in urban areas and on rural roads other than motorways. Hence, the implementation of ITS for the purpose of reducing crash risk should concentrate in urban areas and on rural roads other than motorways. Intelligent speed adaptation is the ITS application with the highest safety potential to reduce injury crashes in the whole road transport system.

 

ITS’ effects on safety through the reduction of injury consequences.

ITS offer sensing and communicating systems that may improve the effectiveness of protective devices such as seat belts and air bags substantially, thereby contributing to the reduction of crash consequences. By means of ITS it will also be possible in the future to design more intelligent restraint systems. At the present level of development the largest safety potential exists in increasing seat belt wearing rates by means of seat belt warning and interlock systems and by means of emergency notification (Mayday) systems.

Implementation of ITS.

In view of the substantial added value of a common approach to legislation and standards for road transport telematics systems, a more co-ordinated approach is needed at a European level. Currently, there are no research-based standards for in-vehicle HMI (Human Machine Interface) and there is an absence of advice concerning compliance in the current guidelines. The future deployment of systems that can benefit safety needs common standards at a European level. Safety systems should not stop working when a car crosses a border. Without common action countries will make different decisions about which architecture to implement for a particular system, with missed opportunities for pan-European benefit. At EU level, there needs to be greater co-ordination between the various Directorates of the Commission. The efforts of different standards organisations which are currently operated by industry and professionals need to be part of a broader European strategy. It is, therefore, recommended that the Commission should establish a European Task Force, reporting via the High Level Group on Telematics to the Council and Parliament, to make an urgent strategic review of the procedures for enacting certification processes and, at a later stage, standards and the need for new standards, particularly in the area of cross-border compatibility and interoperability.

The following recommendations concerning action from the European Union are made:

  1. Strategy

  1. It is clear from the current situation that the European Union needs to establish a long-term strategy on ITS with a view to road safety. It also needs to develop its role in giving advice to industry with regard to design, development, implementation and evaluation of new products. It is important to ensure that the potential benefits to the community are maximised and that any disadvantages are minimised. The key issue is how such a process should be developed and designed.
  2. Priority should be given to the development of ITS that address identified road safety problems, rather than to promoting technologies for their own sake. Other general aims than safety are, of course, legitimate as long as safety is not hampered.
  3. The EU should encourage the early European-wide implementation of those ITS which have proven safety benefits.
  4. The EU should give priority in long-term development to systems that have a significant potential to improve safety.
  5. The EU should ensure that ITS introduced on the market is monitored and evaluated from a safety point of view.

B. Specific Actions

  1. The European Statement of Principles on Human Machine Interface for In-Vehicle Information and Communication Systems, as presented by the European Commission in 1998, represents an initial, non-mandatory approach to design and installation. The Statement of Principles needs to be made more specific and should define

  • a procedure that should be followed to ensure compliance with these principles;
  • a certification process through which products can be shown to have complied with these principles.

Steps to move beyond the current knowledge embodied in the Statement of Principles are recommended under (C) below.

  1. A mandatory certification procedure to approve ITS applications in terms of system safety should be developed at a European level (reliability issues and the availability of adequate fallback procedures need to be addressed, as a system failure might put the road user in a very dangerous situation). The existing procedures for ensuring system safety should also be adopted at the international standards level, through ISO. Specifically, the need for standardisation and quality assurance of relevant control algorithms and protocols should be addressed.
  2. Implementing ITS requires special consideration for safety in the transition phases  -which may last several decades-  during which car fleets, driver abilities, and ITS functions and interfaces will be very varied. The EU should establish a monitoring system to evaluate the design, development and implementation of ITS and their short, medium, and long-term impacts on traffic safety, that is, the overall safety effect of ITS on the traffic system.

C. Promoting Research

  1. The Statement of Principles is only an interim measure. Research needs to be carried out in the EU Fifth Framework Programme to identify the link between levels of performance in HMI and effects on traffic safety. This would allow a research-based set of performance standards for in-vehicle HMI to be developed and proper attention to be given to cognitive ergonomics. The experience obtained with HMI in fields such as aviation should be taken into account.
  2. The further development and proper application of evaluation tools for traffic safety should be required in European-funded research and development projects and when ITS are implemented, for example, in the Trans-European Road Network. This would help to ensure that negative effects are minimised and that knowledge on how to maximise safety benefits is increased.
  3. Research on promising safety applications, such as Seatbelt Warning and Interlock Systems and Intelligent Speed Adaptation, including the study of alternative systems and the development of implementation strategies, should be carried out in the Fifth Framework Programme.

Today, road transport is by far the most dangerous mode of transport. The strictest safety criteria should be applied in the future, in order to reach the safety levels of, for example, rail transport, where fatalities are considered simply unacceptable. The opportunities offered by ITS should not be wasted!

 

Acknowledgements

ETSC gratefully acknowledges the contributions of members of ETSC’s Road Transport Telematics Working Party to this review:

Working Party Members

Prof. Kåre Rumar (Chairman) (S) Dr. Oliver Carsten (UK)

Mr. Dominique Fleury (F) Mr. Tom Heijer (NL)

Dr. Jan Kildebogaard (DK) Dr. Risto Kulmala (FIN)

Dr. Gunnar Lind S) Mr. Klaus Machata (A)

Prof. Vito Mauro (I) Prof. Dr. Ing. Heinz Zackor (D)

Mr. John Berry (European Commission, Observer)

ETSC Staff

Mrs Jeanne Breen

Ms. Marie Ward

ETSC is grateful for the financial support provided by DGVII of the European Commission and for the contribution towards the printing and dissemination costs of this review provided by 3M Europe, Ford Europe, BP Amoco, and KeyMed. The contents of this review are the sole responsibility of ETSC and do not necessarily reflect the view of sponsors nor organisations to which research staff participating in the Working Party belong.