Current car safety technology is fundamentally flawed. That means it’s limited to line-of-sight. Or perhaps the “sensing” line is more accurate. That’s because the way cameras and lidar work is to inspect the vehicle’s surroundings and use predictive algorithms to understand the movement of objects in relation to the movement of the vehicle itself. That’s a good thing, as automakers add elements like pedestrian and cyclist detection to ensure drivers don’t hurt the most vulnerable road users. And unfortunately, this is necessary. Because despite a slight decline in drivers hitting bicyclists and pedestrians in 2023, pedestrian fatalities are still up 14 percent since 2019, according to the latest data from the Governor’s Highway Safety Association. The number of deaths caused by bicycles has increased by 50. Percentage since 2010.
This does not mean that LIDAR and cameras have “stopped working”, but they are reliant on what the sensors can detect, so they are not necessarily able to identify hazards as quickly as necessary (drivers (Warning) This is not possible. Lane 300 feet from the road, just above the next high point. Yes, current sensing currently works well in figuring out the pace of traffic jams, and if it fails, automatic emergency braking can be activated to bring the car to a halt. However, there are still limitations regarding non-vehicle obstacles.
This requires a better technology called Connected Vehicle to Everything (C-V2X). The idea is not that complicated. In summary, this is a chipset that operates on a fraction of the cellular bandwidth, allowing vehicles that incorporate this technology (e.g. electric bikes and cars) to not only monitor anything with a C-V2X chip. , broadcasts its position in pulses. 10 times per second. This high-precision positioning system can alert cyclists on the road ahead, even if they are out of line of sight, and in an emergency situation can prevent a collision, perhaps because the cyclist was in the path of a car. .
You might pause for a moment and think that with 5G, you don’t need another system. Since phones already have GPS and fitness apps already have direction predictions, you could probably layer direction predictions through the app. However, there is a problem with accuracy between base stations: delay. If the phone calls drop out, the text messages don’t go through, or the line gets a little scratchy, that’s kind of a glitch, and if the information you need to send is the exact location in relation to a two-ton pickup truck, it’s fatal. It may become a target. Also, cell phone coverage is not everywhere.
“So with C-V2X, you don’t need Verizon or ATT or anything like that,” explains Audi’s Kamal Kapadia. It does not use a cellular network and uses a portion of the cellular bandwidth to enable direct communication between objects or vehicles. Audi has been working on C-V2X for nearly a decade and is part of a group called the American Cyclist Safety Coalition, which also includes suppliers such as Bosch, a technology startup in an area called spoke safety, and bicycle brands. include. His network includes suppliers from giant Trek, his parts supplier Shimano, more niche bike manufacturers like Switzerland’s Stromer, and even telecom giants like Qualcomm, Deutsche Telekom and TELUS.
Why this is important now is that the FCC is solidifying its rulemaking and standards for this spectrum to allow companies to use their systems and their specific frequencies for all sorts of safety-related purposes. It’s from. Brad Staats, who manages government affairs at Audi, uses C-V2X beacons on EMS vehicles to modify a series of “smart” stop lights to “allow fire trucks to prioritize signals.” He said red lights on busy roads could be changed. “This doesn’t currently exist, but it could exist. That would give emergency responders a ‘wave’ of a green light so they could deal with the incident sooner.”
Kapadia explains that there is another aspect as well. “The longer the distance, the more we are sending messages that we call safety-enhancing technologies, giving drivers information that gives them an earlier opportunity to avoid the icy road or traffic jam ahead.”
Bicycle brands are also participating
Mio Suzuki is director of embedded systems at Trek Bicycle, and “we’re looking for all kinds of safety,” she says. For example, Trek recently introduced its own radar tail lights that alert riders to rapidly approaching vehicles. Garmin has had a similar system for several years. But Suzuki is interested in C-V2X, which provides more advanced warning than rear radar. “And unlike cars, our road users are very vulnerable, so we don’t have big metal shields around us, so our senses and the rider’s awareness of the riding environment need to be strengthened.”
What Suzuki believes this direct communication has the potential to do is to communicate that “imminent danger is approaching, that is, a car may be coming from the side, but the view of the car is obstructed.” It is an electric bicycle equipped with a display that warns the rider. It’s a building so you can’t see the riders. ”
Franz Reindl is CTO of Stromer, a high-end Swiss brand that only produces electric bikes with the best technology, including ABS brakes. Reindl said he is also researching C-V2X. He said, “Safety is one of our biggest promises and we need to do everything we can with our products and technology to make them safer for our customers.”