James Sayer: Connected Vehicle Safety Pilot
Model Deployment; it's about vehicles communicating
with one another wirelessly.
The idea being that if you know where other
vehicles are located around you and you know
where you are, essentially drivers could be
warned about potential crashes.
Peter Sweatman: Safety Pilot Model Deployment
is probably the most exciting project we’ve
ever done here at UMTRI, and we are doing
it right here in Ann Arbor deploying nearly
3000 vehicles who talk to each other.
And in doing so we are creating a million
connections, almost a million connections
between those vehicles.
This is a real glimpse of the future.
That’s why everyone is so excited about
it.
James Sayer: So the technology is a lot like
Wi-Fi, and that the vehicles transmit a signal
and other vehicles are listening for those
signals.
They are wireless, they happen faster than
most Wi-Fi, but you need that really high
speed so that there aren’t delays; crashes
happen transpire really quickly.
There is lot of other potential benefits about
this wireless communication.
You can also communicate with the infrastructure,
the environment, traffic signals, things of
that nature, and you can get warnings about
traffic congestion, you could get advice about
alternative routes where you will consume
less fuel.
But right now we are really emphasizing is
the safety features, crash warnings, two drivers
and in order to help address roughly 34,000
people who die in America each year as a result
of motor vehicle crashes.
James Sayer:I don’t know that I’ve seen
a lot of Camry's in here.
Male Speaker: This one is brand-new.
It’s just got 900 miles on it.
James Sayer: 900 miles on it, okay, good deal!
So the vehicles that are in the study are
actually people’s personal vehicles.
They are bringing their vehicles in, we’re
instrumenting them with this wireless device
that will allow it to transmit basic information
about latitude, longitude or the position
of the vehicle, how fast it’s going and
what direction it’s heading.
So this is an example of one of the devices
we are installing in people’s personal vehicles.
It is a dedicated short range communication
device works at 5.9 gigahertz.
It also takes information from a GPS antenna
that’s mounted in the vehicle.
Peter Sweatman: Moving into a system that’s
designed to avoid a lot of the problems that
we’ve had in the past, and this is going
to be much, much more effective.
Our objective here is to reduce fatalities
and injuries in motor vehicles by an order
of magnitude and to make sure that we are
seeing entrepreneurship in Michigan, and so
that we are expanding the base, the automotive
base in this state with these intelligent
transportation systems.
So UMTRI, this Safety Pilot Model Deployment
is absolutely in a sweet spot as far as UMTRI’s
future is concerned.
