The feasibility of undertaking a
naturalistic driving project in
New Zealand
Peter Baas
Current road safety research tools
Police crash data
(CAS)
Limited by Police:
role, resources and
reporting
Driving simulator
Snapshot in controlled
studies at Waikato Uni environment
Need to understand real
life driving behaviours
Examples of possible NDB use
in New Zealand
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Driver inattention
Driver fatigue
Failure to see other party
Young drivers
Safety of older drivers
Self explaining roads
Link between safety and fuel efficiency
Fleet safety
Self explaining roads
 Road designs that promote desirable
driver behaviour
 Changing driver scripts and schema
(hierarchy of roads)
Next stage of SER research
MSI (FRST) funded research with
instrumented vehicle:
 Influence of road environment on speed
 Road features that redirect driver
attention
 Tandem model (Samuel Charlton)
Safety & fuel efficiency
 Common driving style:
– Anticipating situation ahead
– Driving to the conditions
– Maintaining a relaxed, calm
driving style
– Managing speed
 35% difference between drivers in
amount of fuel used
Alexander Petroleum
 Achieved in 3 years:
– 18% reduction in fuel consumption (l/100km)
– 50% reduction in incidents
– 99% reduction in 90km/h speed exception
reports from vehicle instrumentation
 Four main factors addressed:
– Management / leadership
– Drivers
– Vehicles
– Journey
SAFEDNZ
 MOT and NZTA driver training scheme
 Based on UK govt scheme with proven safety
and fuel efficiency benefits
 Launched July 2010
 284 drivers trained (7.26% fuel saving on day of
training)
–
www.safednz.govt.nz
SAFEDNZ Senior instructors
• Standard circuit ~ 35 km long
• Mix of: urban and rural roads,
intersections and different terrains
• Before and after measurements
Reduction Reduction Reduction Reduction Reduction Reduction
in trip
in brake
in braking in time
in fuel use in gear
spent
time
changes
use
distance
braking
6.0%
4.9%
48.2%
25.7%
38.3%
49.8%
Effect on travel time
 Fuel savings diminish when driver has to manage
fuel and time saving together (Dogan et al 2011)
 Drivers speed to keep the boss happy
 Small reductions in posted speed limit have minor
impact on travel time (Archer, Fotheringham et al 2008, Haworth, Ungers et
al 2001)
 5 minute difference in travel time but 30% difference
in fuel use for 61km journeys in Melbourne (RACV 2000)
Influence of fleet management on
safety
 Fleets with good safety management systems: have
less than ½ the crash rate of those that don’t
irrespective of fault
 Crash rates halved when safety management
systems introduced
Based on:
– Analysis of the crash rates of 48,000 heavy vehicles in NSW,
Queensland and Victoria, half of which were accredited to Trucksafe or
NHVAS
– US, Australian, Canadian and other studies
NDB tool limitations
 Cost: NZ has very small road safety research
budget
 Large sample sizes often required
 Variables measured and equipment required can
vary considerably
 Data analysis can be complex and time consuming
 May be more suited for comparative studies in
NZ especially the effectiveness of interventions
Possible equipment options
 Most have GPS, video cameras (2 to 6),
accelerometers, microphone and event trigger
 Range in price from $500 to >$60,000
 DriverVisionR by Transecurity (ex 100 car
study) about $15,000
 Low cost systems ($500 to $1,000) developed
for fleet monitoring purposes (e.g. Drive Cam).
Promoted by insurance companies.
Key measures for basic system
 Camera data
 GPS
 Lateral and longitudinal acceleration
 Speed
 Speech (to help identify events)
T-eye ADR3000 trial
 Video images acceptable
 Unable to identify events from accelerometer
(poor resolution)
 Generally difficult to identify events. Would
require highly trained observers
 Driver wore sunglasses most of the time,
making it very hard to check if distracted
 Looking at trialling SBX3100 device
 For Self Explaining Roads research will use
Waikato Uni instrumented vehicle.
Summary
 NDB tools provide the opportunity to make a
major step forward in the understanding how
to improve road safety and fuel efficiency
 Likely NZ use is for evaluating the effectiveness
of interventions because of cost
 International collaboration would help