Independent Research Studies
The Dutch Ministry of Transport has recently released the
TNO Final Report, which contains the findings of a
large-scale field operational test of active driver assistance
systems, so called accident prevention systems (APS), for
lorries.
This large-scale study involved more than 2,400 lorries
supplied by 123 companies and lasted 8 months. During this time
a total of around 77 million kilometers of driving behavior
were measured during normal daily driving on Dutch motorways.
"A forward collision warning system will have a
high potential in preventing rear end accidents."
"Most often the cause of such accidents is
inattention."
'Roads to the Future: The Assisted
Driver’, Report from the Dutch Ministry of
Transport (2007)
"Most drivers are positive or neutral about making
AWS obligatory." (pp. 26, Sec. 6.3.1)
"In the second measurement, more drivers indicate
that AWS simplifies the task of driving in comparison with
the first measurement. In that measurement, they also
recommend the system more empathically within their own
environment." (pp. 26, Sec. 6.3.1)
"In the second measurement, drivers indicate that
they maintain a greater following distance when using
HMW" (pp. 27)
"Most of them always have AWS switched on,
irrespective of the type of road or prevailing weather
conditions." (pp. 27)
"In general, we can state that users do not enjoy
being corrected, but do view the system as an asset."
(pp. 27, Sec. 6.3.2)
"LDW and HMW in their own car?
The majority of
participants in the pilot would –
depending on the price – like to have LDW
and HMW installed in their own cars. They refer to an average
price of €500 (with exceptions ranging from
€250 until €5,000)."
(pp. 28)
"The majority of participants in the pilot are
satisfied with AWS. They find the system easy to use and
believe that driving with both LDW and HMW is conducive to
road safety. This is due to the fact that
drivers’ adapt their driving behavior (in
a positive sense) in order to minimise the number of
warnings. Participants also maintain their distance better,
use their indicators more often and maintain their direction
on the road more effectively. Furthermore, they also find the
task of driving to be less demanding overall. Bear in mind
though that this is their opinion. " (pp. 28)
Objective studies:
"The LDW system issues a warning every time the
vehicle crosses a line (desired or undesired) that does not
go hand in hand with the use of direction indicators. LDW
therefore encourages the use of indicators. 10. Direction
indicators are used more often and more effectively."
(pp. 46)
"In addition to more effective use of direction
indicators, it is likely that drivers will maintain a greater
distance from line markings due to the LDW system. This is
reflected in both SDLP and the average position of the
vehicle in relation to the middle of the lane. " (pp.
46)
"Table 8.7 displays the result of this analysis.
We can conclude from the table, for example, that ACC can
prevent a maximum of 48.8% of accidents on through-roads (on
road sections). For LDW, this is 4.6%. Together, ACC and LDW
reduce the number of accidents on through- roads by a maximum
of 53.4%. This is 6.7% of the total number of accidents on
road sections and 3.4% of the total number of accidents (road
sections and intersections combined). " (pp. 51)
"On the basis of changes in the use of direction
indicators (increase of roughly 20%, depending on the road
type) and the number of unintentional line crossings (also
20% approximately), we discover an effectiveness of 20% for
LDW. " (pp. 95)
This document summarizes the findings that analyzed
the economic costs and benefits for three commercial motor
vehicle onboard safety systems:
- Forward Collision Warning Systems
- Lane Departure Warning Systems
- Roll Stability Control Systems
General
The Mobileye™ Collision prevention Assistance System (CPAS)
is a driver assistance
system for collision prevention and mitigation.
CPAS is based on a camera located on the vehicle’s front windshield that watches
the road ahead. The CPAS utilizes advanced vision technologies for:
- Lane detection and road curvature calculation
– the CPAS detects and measures lane position relative to the vehicle and provides distance to lane marks,
detection of lane crossing including lane crossing prediction
(by calculating Time to Lane Crossing - TLC) for earlier warnings than received from actual rumble-strips.
- Vehicle detection
the CPAS detects vehicles ahead, and measures their distance, azimuth, relative speed
and Time to Contact (TTC). The CPAS uses these calculations for providing continuous headway
and potential collision related information. The road curvature calculation provided by the lane
detection capability enables to identify which of the vehicles ahead is in the same lane as the “host vehicle”.
Its detection of vehicles and lane markings provides
the driver with the following saftey alert types:
- Forward Collision Warning (FCW) – alerting the driver of an
impending collision with the vehicle ahead (up to 2.7 seconds before collision occurs)
- Lane Departure Warning (LDW) – acting as “audible rumble strips”,
LDW produces an alert sound up to 0.5 seconds before unintentionally
departing from the lane or the road altogether
- Headway Monitoring and Warning (HMW) – enables continuous monitoring
of the driving distance (headway) kept from the vehicle ahead,
and warns the driver when headway decreases to a dangerous level
These 3 features correspond with 3 of the leading causes of road collisions:
- Rear-end collisions caused by driver inattention
- Lane departure, and Run Off Road (ROR) collisions
- Rear-end collisions caused by insufficient distance keeping
Statistics on Accidents Worldwide
- There are 1.2 million fatalities yearly worldwide due to road accidents - 3242 people a day!
- According to the World Health Organization, road accident fatalities worldwide are expected to rise by 67% by the year 2020.
- Over 20 million people are injured each year in road accidents
- Financial damages of road accidents are ~2% of world GDP.
- In the US, in 2003 there were 6 million accidents, costing $230 million; averaging $38,000 per accident – these statistics have been steady in recent years.
Studies and Statistics on Causes of Accidents and Accident Prevention:
- 93% of all accidents are due to human factor (Driver inattention cited as the primary cause for accidents).
- Nearly 80% of all crashes involve driver inattention within three
seconds before the event. Examples of types of inattention that increase crash risk:
- Talking on a cell phone (increases risk by 30%)
- Dialing a cell phone (increases risk by 300%)
- Drowsiness (increases risk by 400% and responsible for ~23% of all crashes and near-crashes)
- Reaching for moving objects, like a falling cup (increases risk by 900%)
- “One in every five vehicle accidents in Germany is caused by drowsiness at the wheel… momentary drowsiness or
inattentiveness is responsible for one in every four accidents on German motorways…
In the United States, as many as 40 percent of highway accidents are due to drowsiness at the wheel…
The economic loss that such vehicle accidents cause each year is estimated at
5 billion euros ($6.4 billion) in Germany alone. ”
- Run Off Road accidents account for nearly 20% of road accidents
and are responsible for 60% of all road accident fatalities.
- “In a study done at Volkswagen, an analysis of the pre-crash braking behavior
shows that in severe accidents about 85% of drivers either did not brake at all or not to
the full possible deceleration.”
- Rear-end collision accidents account for about 28% of road accidents.
Forward Collision Warning (FCW) Systems
- A study by Daimler Benz shows that an extra 0.5 second early warning can prevent 60%
of rear-end collisions, and 1.5 seconds will prevent 90% of them.
- A University of Adelaide study showed that in 29% of cases the driver did not attempt to brake at all
before the collision [7] either because they were not aware of the danger at all,
or had insufficient time to react.
- CPAS provides a Forward Collision Warning to the driver 2.7 seconds on average before
colliding with the vehicle ahead. The average driver takes 0.66 seconds to press the brakes [8].
Thus, on average, the CPAS enables the driver a critical 2 seconds of actual braking!
Empiric Evidence of Effective Accident Reduction
Strips:
- “A New York study showed…on the New York State Thruway, ROR crashes were reduced 88 percent,
from a high of 588 crashes in 1993 to 74 in 1997. Total injuries were reduced 87 percent,
from a 1992 high of
407 to 54 in 1997. Fatalities were reduced 95 percent, from 17 in 1991 and 1992 to 1 fatality
in 1997.”
- “After Delaware DOT installed centerline rumble strips on U.S. Route 301--a two-lane,
undivided rural highway with
a high fatality rate--the head-on collision rate decreased 90 percent, and fatalities
decreased to zero. These dramatic safety improvements were achieved despite a 30 percent
increase in traffic.” [9].
Headway warning
- “…drivers tend to overestimate their headway and consequently drive with short and
potentially dangerous headways…” [10]
- “…IVCAWS (in-vehicle collision avoidance warning systems) are a useful tool for educating
drivers to estimate headway more accurately… after a relatively short exposure to the system,
drivers were able to maintain longer and safer headways for at least six months…” [8]
- “…In the U.S., rear-end collisions represent approximately 30% of all car crashes on public
roads [NHTSA, 1999]. One of the major causes of such accidents is the failure of the following
car to maintain the proper distance from the lead car. In most cases, failure to
maintain safe headway can be attributed to driver inattention and/or misjudgment of
distance [Knipling et al.,1993]… ” [11]
Mobileye CPAS Abilities and Behavior
Mobileye is the winner of the 2006 Entrepreneurial Company of the Year Award in the Automotive
Industry by Frost & Sullivan, who have stated:
“The passenger cars in Europe are likely to be factory installed with the vision-based LDW starting
from 2007 and
at least five car platforms are expected to be installed with this system supplied
by Mobileye in 2007. By 2010, all major vehicle manufacturers are expected to introduce the
vision-based safety systems in the market.
Mobileye has got a head start over its competitors,
since its system is capable of performing
functions such as forward collision warning, headway warning and LDW in addition to the
video-collision recording option.”
“Market participants have advocated the cost and life saving potential of the LDW system and fleet
owners are beginning to realize the value in utilizing the LDW system.
Currently, the aftermarket
system supplied by other market participants offer only the LDW function. However, by providing
more functions over and above the LDW function, for the same price as the companies’ competitors,
Frost & Sullivan expects Mobileye to capture a large chunk of the truck aftermarket.”
Driver response time is crucial when attempting to avoid a road accident. Mobileye CPAS provides a
distracted driver with early warnings
that give them more time to react and regain control of the situation which otherwise would
end in a certain collision.
It has been demonstrated already that LDW systems can dramatically reduce the amount of accidents in commercial fleets.
Surmounting the abilities of its competitors’, Mobileye CPAS supplies not one, but three types of warnings in road scenarios that are responsible
for more than 65% of all road accident fatalities.
[6]NHTSA – “The Relative Frequency Of Unsafe Driving Acts In Serious Traffic Crashes”
[7]http://casr.adelaide.edu.au/speed/vol-1.html
[8]ISO-15623 for FCW Systems
[9]Rumble Strips - Corporate Research & Technology - FHWA
[10]Effects of an In-Vehicle Collision Avoidance Warning System on Short and Long-Term Driving Performance - Avner Ben-Yaacov, Masha Maltz, and David Shinar, Ben-Gurion University
[11]Effects of an In-Vehicle Collision Avoidance Warning System on Short and Long-Term Driving (Avner Ben-Yaacov, Masha Maltz, and David Shinar, Ben-Gurion University)
[12]www.fleetnewsnet.co.uk – 9 October 2006