Overview
eSafety was a joint industry-public sector initiative driven by the European Commission and co-chaired by ERTICO - ITS Europe and ACEA (Association of European Car Manufacturers), with the aim to promote the development, deployment, and use of Intelligent Vehicle Safety Systems to enhance road safety throughout Europe. Sustainable solutions can only be created together with all stakeholders on the European level.
eSafety Support stimulated and monitored the activities, progress and results generated by the eSafety initiative by offering support to the eSafety Forum and its Working Groups and disseminating results to all stakeholders.
eSafety Support devised and maintained a system for monitoring the progress on each of the 28 eSafety priority recommendations through close cooperation with the eSafety Forum Working Groups, R&D projects and other contributing activities. eSafety Support is responsible for building a knowledge base and providing a synthetic overview and executive 'state-of-work' in key thematic areas covered by the eSafety initiative.
The project aimed to:
1. Support the development, deployment and use of intelligent integrated road safety systems by strengthening the eSafety cooperation and promoting the benefits to the end users.
2. Support the dialogue between all eSafety stakeholders through organising dedicated events and promote public outreach through targeted activities.
- Monitor and promote the implementation of the eSafety Working Group recommendations and dissemination of results through the website and through other dissemination material.
- Support the implementation process for a European eCall system by promoting the eCall toolbox.
- Support the development of the implementation Road Map for all eSafety systems by using the previous work as foundation.
- Organise eSafety stakeholder meetings (workshops, plenary, high level, and steering group meetings), provide administrative support to the eSafety Forum activities through an independent eSafety Support Secretariat in Brussels, and actively participate in relevant external eSafety events.
- Launch minor studies on topics identified and endorsed by the eSafety Forum.
- Support the i2010 initiative in particular the activities dealing with user outreach and deployment of smarter, safer and cleaner vehicles in the future.
The eSafety Working Groups focused on domain-specific priority areas that are important for the implementation of the eSafety Working Group recommendations, and in line with the actions brought forward in the Commission Communication.
- Accident Causation Analysis
- Communications
- Digital Maps
- Emergency Call (eCall)
- Heavy Duty Vehicles
- Human-Machine Interaction (HMI)
- ICT for Clean and Efficient Mobility
- Implementation Road Map
- Intelligent Infrastructure
- International Cooperation
- Nomadic Device Forum
- Real-time Traffic and Travel Information (RTTI)
- Research and Technological Development
- eSecurity
- Service-oriented Architectures
- User Outreach.
Funding
Results
eSafety Support reported on progress on the eSafety recommendations, as follows:
1. Recommendations that have been fulfilled or nearly fulfilled and there are no deviations from the expected progress:
- Impact assessment of safety systems Methodology
- Set up coordinated FOTs (Field Operational Tests)
- Determine clear goals and priorities for further RTD (Research and Technological Development)
- Societal aspects: estimate the socio-economic benefits
- The eSafety Forum
2. Recommendation that have not been fulfilled or some deviations from the expected progress are present, due to some bottlenecks. Further actions are needed to insure a smooth progress:
- Accident Causation Data
- Human-Machine Interaction
- Road Map for Intelligent Integrated Safety
- Interfaces and communications protocols for V2V (vehicle to vehicle) and V2I (vehicle to infrastructure)
- Pursue International Cooperation
- The European Safety Map database
- Emergency Calls (e-Calls) and E-1123
- Real-time Traffic and Traveller Information (RTTI)
- Motor vehicle type-approval legislation
- Safety systems standards and regulation in the EU
- Legal issues of market introduction of IIRSS (intelligent integrated road safety systems)
- User Outreach
3. Recommendations that are far from being fulfilled or there are some important deviations that risk jeopardising its fulfilment. Special attention should be given to undertake actions to bring the progress back on track:
- Ultra wide-band 24 GHz short range radar
- Societal aspects: incentives
- The different business cases.
Technical Implications
After 10 fruitful years, the eSafety Forum not only took into account changes in the policy and social framework but also changed its name (iMobility Forum) to reflect its field of work to include ICT systems for resource-efficient and clean mobility in addition to its original focus on ICT-based safety technologies.
Succeeding to the eSafety Support, a new support action was launched in 2009, iCar Support (December 2009 to November 2012) whose aim is to support the implementation of actions and recommendations resulting from the work of the iMobility Forum and the Intelligent Car Initiative. This includes support to the iMobility Forum and its constituencies, including its Steering Group, Working Groups and Task Forces, strengthening the iMobility Forum cooperation among stakeholders, supporting the development of the Implementation Road Map for all iMobility Forum systems, contributing to the implementation process of the European eCall system by supporting the European eCall Implementation Platform, supporting the i2010 initiative in particular the activities dealing with user outreach and deployment of smarter, safer and cleaner vehicles in the future.
The Intelligent Car initiative has come to an end and is followed by a new initiative: the Digital Agenda for Europe (DAE). The DAE defines the key role of ICT to enable Europe to succeed in its ambitions for 2020. Within this area, actions 92 to 95 of the Digital Agenda refer to transport. In particular, Action 92: Increase the speed of Intelligent Transport System (ITS) take-up, in particular for road and urban transport, by applying the proposed ITS Directive in support of interoperability and rapid standardisation. (http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/digital-agenda/index_en.htm)
iMobility Support will be kicked off 1st January 2013, will support the deployment of intelligent mobility in Europe by organising iMobility Forum activities including but not limited to stakeholder networking, deployment support, awareness raising and dissemination of results.