The back-up camera mandate should be implemented. A simplified do-not-touch-your-phone law should be promoted. And DSRC modules should be mandated on commercial and emergency vehicles. Those are the results of a survey of attendees at the recent Telematics Update V2V conference in Novi, Mich., regarding US Department of Transportation priorities.
Respondents were asked to vote on 10 To-Do items previously recommended for incoming U.S. Secretary of Transportation Anthony Foxx and detailed in a Strategy Analytics blog (tinyurl.com/meud4m7 ). Perhaps it is not surprising that these respondents nearly universally agreed that commercial vehicles and emergency vehicles ought to be prioritized for deployment of modules enabling dedicated short range communication (DSRC) messaging. But DSRC-based V2V technology was not the only thing on their minds.
Respondents strongly agreed that anti-texting laws and hands-free phone initiatives were probably doing more to confuse drivers than they were to mitigate distracted driving. For those reasons, 61.5% said they agreed that a do-not-touch-your-phone law to simplify the rules and the enforcement of anti-distraction laws was a worthy task for the incoming Secretary.
But the biggest headline-grabbing support of 84.6% and 92.3%, respectively, was voiced for the deployment of DSRC for commercial and emergency vehicles. The complete results appear following the verbatim comments (below) where respondents offered their own priorities for the new DOT Secretary.
“Congestion mitigation (congestion pricing, traffic information, V2I, etc.) … high levels of congestion as we see in San Francisco and other cities is getting worse and will have a greater negative economic impact.
“Collision mitigation technologies for heavy trucks (as in #5).
“ITS (information hotspots) similar to the ITS hotspots in Japan – in-vehicle signage and traffic information.
“#7 (above) is a key element of research – can DSRC and LTE play together well (as in) spectrum sharing etc. We are (encouraging) the wireless community to come to the Novi CVTB V2I Test bed and try LTE and DSRC first as a simcast of messages on both channels.”
“Reorganize US DOT to improve efficiency. As an example, there are a minimum of three organizations with DOT that have commercial vehicle oversight and rule-making authority. There should only be one.
“Reassign all policy and governance for the Connected Vehicle program from the JPO to the FHWA office of policy. JPO has had this in their hands for the past 5+ years and have not moved the ball. The technical people are making decisions that will require a lot of work to modify if the policy people don’t follow the same path. They should be working together and with the industry.”
“The total benefit for back-up camera systems as a visual-only warning mechanism have not been sufficiently compared to back-up object detection systems that incorporate automatic brake control. Whichever of those two approaches shows the greatest likelihood of saving lives should be what is legislated.
“DSRC systems have not yet been sufficiently studied as an approach to improve existing active safety mechanisms. This study should be performed, and if the results prove positive, it should be considered whether to mandate those integrated active safety mechanisms whenever DSRC may be mandated.
“As a subset to #4 (above), I would urge DOT to encourage/facilitate an industry discussion about legal liability in accidents involving autonomous systems. Start the discussion now before a headline-grabbing accident or class action lawsuit has everyone declaring ‘Not our fault!’ and expending all their energies on protecting themselves.”
“Provide the metropolitan area with a means (public transport, emergency, taxi, …) to upgrade roadside units with DSRC.
“Mandate DSRC for cabs in major cities.
“Provide new infrastructure plan with networking capability.
“Generate green and SDC lane on highway.”
“Release Safety Pilot results/data ASAP (the lack of information is causing everyone to adopt a wait-and-see approach).
“Ensure that all new highway developments/upgrades have DSRC fitted (the cost is miniscule compared to the cost of the road).
“Ensure that all new traffic light deplyments have DSRC fitted (the price of RSEs woud tumble in the face of such opportunities).”
“Research programs, initiatives, incentive programs focusing on driver distraction countermeasures via technological solutions (e.g. voice interfaces, improved HMIs, lockouts).
“Focus on improvements to the nation’s crumbling infrastructure (roads and bridges).
“Focus on driver fatigue/drowsiness as a safety area (like LaHood did with driver distraction).
“Much greater focus on commercial vehicle safety research; greater funding allocations to FMCSA and FTA research programs.”
And the complete results:
#1 – Mandate: Do Not Touch Your Phone While Driving
Yes: 61.5% No: 23.1% Don’t Know: 15.4%
#2 – Endorse California legislation AB 397 for the creation of a VIN-based Next of Kin Notification database.
Yes: 46.1% No: 15.4% Don’t Know: 38.5%
#3 - Implement the back-up camera mandate.
Yes: 69.2% No: 15.4% Don’t Know: 15.4%
#4 – Provide a legislative framework and guidelines for states to register and license self-driving cars with the sole requirement that drivers must be in the driver seat and responsible for control of the vehicle.
Yes: 53.8% No: 38.5% Don’t Know: 7.7%
#5 – Initiate a process for mandating the installation of DSRC modules on commercial vehicles in FMCSA Classes 6, 7, 8.
Yes: 84.6% No: 0 Don’t Know: 15.4%
#6 – Require the installation of DSRC modules on all emergency and service vehicles.
Yes: 92.3% No: 0 Don’t Know: 7.7%
#7 – Add LTE and LTE Advanced modules to all current DSRC tests.
Yes: 38.5% No: 38.5% Don’t Know: 23.1%
#8 – Highlight elements of Next Gen 911 research focused on the acquisition of crash scene information including text, video, data and voice via smartphones.
Yes: 61.5% No: 7.7% Don’t Know: 30.7%
#9 – Highlight app development intended to improve the functioning of all transit including public transportation, traffic information, schedules, traffic, car and ride sharing.
Yes: 84.6% No: 7.7% Don’t Know: 7.7%
#10 – Roadside Bluetooth installations should be required to add DSRC.
Yes: 53.8% No: 15.4% Don’t Know: 30.7%