TRL | Do drivers even need to be in the car?

Picture the scene - it's a dark, winter evening commute on a busy city highway, rain lashing down and wipers furiously trying to keep the view ahead clear. You sit behind the wheel, crawling along in nose-to-tail traffic. Bright headlights flash constantly from oncoming vehicles and taillights blink far into the distance ahead. Cyclists whizz by to your offside and crowds of pedestrians wait to cross the road, a blur of bodies, umbrellas and buggies. The satnav continues to bleat instructions, despite your crawling speed. Your favourite song comes on the radio, so you turn up the volume and sing along badly loudly, tapping along to the beat on your steering wheel to offset the boredom.
 
As a driver, are we really as attentive as we think?
 
The cacophony of light, sound and movement when we drive is an all too familiar experience to many of us, I am sure. Competing demands from weather, unpredictable behaviour of other road users and technological distractions inside the vehicle (not to mention other unsafe in-vehicle behaviours like dancing along to music, eating or making and receiving phone calls) mean that, as drivers, we must filter out a lot of the incoming information we are receiving. This activity is prone to human error. It is hardly surprising that 'failed to look' has long been cited as a contributory cause for collisions involving other road users.
 
What if we could make drivers of the future safer by removing them from the vehicle completely?
 
It’s not as revolutionary as it sounds; hear me out. Automated Driving System (ADS) technology already exists to enable a remote operator to undertake all the dynamic steering, accelerating and braking manoeuvres necessary to control a vehicle from a far-off location. Remote operators could be used to drive passenger shuttles for public transport, carrying more passengers and removing existing private vehicles from the roads. Work is ongoing to certify and validate ADS systems such as these at the Smart Mobility Living Lab (SMLL) in London through simulation testing using a 'digital twin' of the road network around the Woolwich Arsenal.

We may instinctively feel that it would be better to be inside a car that you are driving; surely you would worry that you may miss important information if you weren't 'there'. But consider the perceptual demand outlined in the earlier description, which we then block out by distracting ourselves even further. Honestly, are we as ‘present’ as we think when inside a vehicle?

A remote operator would have access to additional sensory information from ADS which can draw attention to information that could be neglected in-situ, such as a cyclist or pedestrian in a blind spot. It would be easier and faster to change viewing perspective when remotely operating than when manually driving. Even more futuristic, vision software can give enhanced awareness of some aspects of the environment by seeing through buildings to show the road ahead using prediction algorithms. It may sound like science fiction, but trust me, it’s science fact!

The ServCity project is right now developing advanced autonomous vehicle technology which can predict other moving objects on the road such as cyclists and pedestrians and respond to them safely, even in complex built up environments. Each of these new technologies offer the potential to offer remote drivers more safety awareness and to take the shared road network a step closer towards zero harm for everyone who uses it.

Despite the evidence that humans are often unsafe drivers, some people are more worried about the safety of autonomous vehicles, imagining that a remote operator may have to take over control while the vehicle is hurtling along at 70mph on the motorway. Remote operators are more likely though to only take over driving control after the vehicle has come to a safe stop and only be driving at very slow speeds, in highly regulated environments. Even so, the extra information that can be accessed via advanced software and telematics means that we could improve driver awareness by taking the ‘driver’ out of the vehicle.

So, worrying about handing over driving control to our robot overlords is a little hasty right now. We will still rely on human drivers long into the future, albeit from a “far off” location. Yet we can make the road safer and reduce the error made through cognitive overload and human-led distractions by using new ADS technology to enhance our perceptual skills.

Sadly, improving the singing skills are up to you.

As part of TRL’s support for Road Safety Week, we will be posting a series of blogs written by our in-house experts, looking across the different themes Brake has identified as encapsulating the overall theme of ‘Safe Roads For All’. TRL’s experts have focused on some specific road users and topics within these themes and have tried to think about how all of this relates to a future in which transport is safe for everyone. The blogs cover active travel (Monday); how we teach children and young people about road safety (Tuesday); speed (Wednesday); road users with differing needs (including a focus on mental health and motorcyclists – Thursday); the future of driving (Friday); and the importance of learning from collisions (Sunday).

Check out TRL’s website and social channels for the latest blog.

Road Safety week runs from 14th to 20th November 2022, to find how out you can support Brake visit Road Safety Week | Brake

About the Author
Dr Clare Mutzenich is Principal Consultant on TRL’s Automation Team and works closely with TRL’s Smart Mobility Living Lab Team to provide consultancy and R&D to a range of domestic and international clients. She possesses a proven track record of drawing on theoretical and evidence-based practice to set the direction in CCAV research projects, devoting attention to managing client relationships and demonstrating high standards of professionalism. Clare has led a wide range of projects into human factors issues in Automation to develop strategies in the safe adoption and deployment of new automated technologies, using a range of techniques to meet clients' needs.  Her PhD thesis investigated situation awareness (SA) in remote operators of automated vehicles, measuring fatigue and workload using eye tracking software.

 

Do drivers even need to be in the car?

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