Renault Road Safety Innovations
As many of us will attest, driving today is nothing like it was 50 years ago. For older generations, seat belts were the only road safety features on most cars but that landscape has changed significantly.
Everything has vastly improved, largely thanks to changes to legislation including reduced speed limits, drinking and driving laws and making it a requirement to have seat belts and airbags in vehicles.
We can owe many of the road safety innovations and changes to companies like LAB – a laboratory founded by Renault and Peugeot Citroën more than 50 years ago.
What Role Does LAB Play In Road Safety?
LAB is responsible for studying accidents, biomechanics and human behaviour in an attempt to improve road safety. With the vast amounts of data they collect and share, stakeholders can make the necessary changes to help boost our confidence about the future of mobility.
If you look at road deaths over the last 35 years, road safety changes have made a tremendous impact; there were 80% fewer road deaths despite an increase in traffic. While it’s undoubtedly a massive improvement, those numbers should go down even further to ensure a safer driving future.
According to Stéphane Buffat, the LAB director: “Using data from real accidents, LAB is able to analyse safety issues. We use the knowledge gained in naturalistic studies to put these issues into perspective and identify types of hazardous scenarios. LAB participates in European studies to share our observations and analyses with all of the players in the safety field, who can then include them in their action plans.”
Road Safety Innovations Making A Difference
There’s no denying that vehicle safety technologies have advanced over the years, not just with seat belts and airbags but connectivity as well. Today, LAB is focusing on developing new driving aids and on increasingly sophisticated vehicle technologies.
As modern vehicles become more connected, we benefit from new services and technologies which usually have a profoundly positive impact on vehicle and road safety. The new Renault Clio is just one example as its driving aids achieved a 5-star rating in the famous Euro NCAP test.
Driving aids, or ADAS (Advanced Driver Assistance Systems), are becoming a more common sight and include various features. Systems like Park Assist and Lane Departure Warning are designed to offer drivers peace of mind about their safety inside the vehicle. At the same time, other more advanced aids, such as adaptive cruise control and active emergency braking, will be compulsory in Europe from 2022.
According to Róza Thun, rapporteur to the European parliament, these types of vehicle and driver safety features will help prevent 25,000 deaths and 14,000 serious injuries by 2038.
Combining Technology And Human Interactions
Regardless of how much technology has advanced and despite our continued reliance on these features, the human factor will remain a vital cog in creating safer mobility. However, considering that 95% of accidents are caused by human error, drivers must know what these aids do and how to use them properly.
According to Laurette Guyonvarch: “Various studies that we have carried out demonstrate that ADAS are not always used correctly, so this suggests a need for training. Audible warnings, for example, could be perceived as irritating. They are only used when any danger is imminent”.
While the human factor is still essential in understanding certain risk factors, one of the biggest stumbling blocks is improving the ergonomics of the interaction between human and machine. How different will it be once the technology is truly in play on autonomous vehicles?
Driving Aids And The Levels Of Autonomy
Studies by LAB have revealed a major contradiction in human behaviour currently concerning driving aids and autonomous vehicles.
“People are naturally resistant to any new technology, but once they have mastered it, they are ready to trust it and go along with it,” said Laurette Guyonvarch.
Driver aids are continuously improving and will also become easier to use but they still may need human supervision when the machine cannot handle it. The level of a vehicle’s driving autonomy is measured on a scale from 0 to 5:
- 0 means the driver must remain active and attentive in every situation
- 1 refers to “feet-off” with “driver assist” technologies including cruise control
- 2 is partial driving automation with “feet and hands-off” tech like cruise control and lane centring assist
- 3 is referred to as conditional driving automation (“eyes-off”) where the driver must be able to take over instantly at any time
- 4 refers to high driving automation (“mind-off) where drivers are not required to perform any driving duties when delegated to a technology
- 5 will be full driving automation
Considering the inevitable future of autonomous vehicles, we will see conventional and driver-less cars co-exist and therein lies a major problem as stated by Laurette Guyonvarch.
“People are hard to manage for an autonomous vehicle. To make a decision, a person is able to consider many factors that appear relevant. The machine, however, bases its decisions on simplified rules and only adapts itself to an extent. The challenge will be to allow the two to co-exist, with the highest possible degree of mutual comprehension. The priority is always safety.”
Simulating Autonomous Driving With Virtual Reality
Considering it’s impossible to rely on real-life studies to verify the effectiveness and suitability of the technologies, the future of autonomous mobility relies on simulations. There are numerous ongoing studies on simulators or in Virtual Reality to determine the efficacy of autonomous driving technologies.
Andras Kemeny, Expert Leader for Simulation and Virtual Reality at Groupe Renault said the following on simulators: “They allow us to see how the tech works and how it is perceived by the driver. They are crucial to technical development. They let us verify the effectiveness and safety in the use of a given system, and also measure the confidence it gives to users. This concept is new, but it really is becoming essential”.
Kemeny believes that autonomy on its own won’t work as its success relies on the human-machine relationship running continuously. It will only be possible with the sharing of information between the vehicle and the driver-in-waiting.
In addition to companies like Renault, other car manufacturers and tech companies have also worked on autonomous driving and road safety innovations including Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple. The technology is advancing at a rapid pace and we are in a strong position, both legally and technologically, to go beyond what is expected. However, the next challenge is to get the motoring public to accept the benefits of autonomous technology.
If given the chance, would you travel in an autonomous car? If you want access to more interesting stories from around the motoring world, follow our blog and join us on Facebook. For a closer look at our new and quality pre-owned Renault vehicles, access our online showroom today.
