Cars of the future will be communicating with one another to avoid crashes.
By DON SHILLING
Soon, your car will be helping you to stay out of an accident.
It will tell you when another car is passing on the side, when you drift out of a lane or when you get drowsy. It also will warn you when a vehicle up ahead is too close or even slow itself down.
"It's quite amazing," said Steve Underwood, a research scientist at the Center for Automotive Research at Ann Arbor, Mich.
The center recently received a $3 million grant from the state of Michigan to help fund a $6.9 million test lab for intelligent transportation systems. Michigan is hoping to attract jobs from the creation of the new technology.
The goal is to use wireless and short-range communication systems that will allow vehicles to communicate with one another, satellites and roadside transponders along the road.
Underwood said he thinks half of all new vehicles will have such communication abilities by 2016 and all of them will carry the equipment as standard features by 2020. Others estimate that the technology will be standard on all cars anywhere from 2015 to 2025.
Underwood declined to speculate on what the equipment would add to the price of a car.
The U.S. Department of Transportation has been pushing for the use of such systems as a way to cut down on the 43,000 traffic deaths and 6.2 million crashes that occur annually.
It's been estimated that communication systems that warn drivers or take over for them could eliminate about 1 million crashes a year, Underwood said recently in Detroit at a seminar for journalists.
He said cars of the future will exchange information with one another on their position and speed. A car that shows up as it is passing on the left, for example, would trigger a warning light on the driver's side mirror, signaling the driver not to change lanes.
The system also would pick up the presence of an ambulance, firetruck or police car responding to an emergency. A warning light would notify the driver to pull to the side.
Cars also will be communicating with roadside devices that will be passing along information. These devices could inform drivers of traffic tie-ups and suggest alternate routes or they could warn drivers of icy conditions ahead.
They also could let a driver know if there is time to pass through a green light safely.
Underwood said the federal government has estimated it would cost $4 billion to place these devices at urban intersections and along highways.
These devices would use bandwidth that has been set aside by the federal government for short-range communications. The signals would travel between 400 and 1,000 feet.
As a side benefit, vehicles would be able to communicate with gas pumps to relay payment information.
Satellite links
In addition to communicating with other vehicles and roadside devices, vehicles also would be linked with satellites, Underwood said.
Besides providing drivers with their location and driving instructions, a satellite link would tell highway departments how roads are being used, he said.
Some people are concerned about privacy issues if vehicles can be tracked as they move, he said. The industry is looking at ways of alleviating those concerns, such as having some data automatically deleted after it is recorded, he said.
On the other hand, a lack of privacy could be seen as a benefit in some cases, he said. For example, new technology could allow parents to know where their children have driven, he said.
Another potential roadblock to the technology would be people's concerns about the car controlling itself, he said. Researchers are looking into when it would be feasible for cars to stop or slow down on their own, he said.
Underwood added that the communications systems would enable new entertainment options, such as being able to access the Internet in the car or download movies.
Industry officials he polled, however, consistently listed these entertainment options at the bottom of best uses for the technology.
The officials said they were most concerned about improving safety. The best uses for the technology are in-vehicle warnings about upcoming intersections and warnings about potential collisions with other vehicles, they said.
Automakers also are testing the use of sensors inside the car to help drivers stay safe. Sensors can examine the facial features of a driver, for example, to determine if drowsiness is setting in.