Overview
In order to avoid expensive dead-ends in the development of new driver assistance systems, it is mandatory to investigate, as thoroughly and as early as possible, the traffic impact, customer acceptance, as well as business and other economic implications. Additionally, it is essential to identify potential problems regarding traffic, regulatory, and liability law, especially in situations where technical systems are designed to take over certain driving tasks in whole or in part from the driver. The project is part of the research initiative INVENT.
The objective of VRA is to develop methods for evaluation of driver assistance systems. The software will be designed with a high degree of standardization and modularization so that users will be able to apply the methods quickly and efficiently. The evaluation procedures designed in VRA will be applied to assess novel assistance systems to be developed in the application projects Congestion Assistance STA and Anticipatory Active Safety VAS. In an iterative process, these procedures will be continually adapted in response to new questions as they arise. By following this procedure, traffic, legal, and economic impacts of these systems will be provided at an early stage.
The impacts of new assistance systems on traffic will be analyzed using traffic simulation. This will allow parallel testing of implementation alternatives and provide a general assessment of comfort and safety improvements. Present and anticipated customer needs will be analyzed and customer acceptance forecasts will be developed. Implications for safe and secure use will be investigated as soon as first system prototypes are available. Legal conditions will be investigated, regarding product liability, Type Approval and liability issues of the systems developed in INVENT. The potential benefits as well as the costs connected with these systems will be assessed at an early stage. Rather than preparing a single report representing a fixed stage of development, the strategy is to provide regularly updated tools suitable for continually refining the assessments as a result of further developments.