“Vehicle technology should never be considered as a replacement for driver training or awareness,” TSR Executive Director Peter Goldwasser stresses.
When roadways are safer, so are fleet drivers. Through regulatory changes and new and emerging technologies, roadways can become more secure for the fleet drivers putting hundreds of miles on them each week.
However, these experts and industry trade groups caution that these technologies don’t always have a positive effect on safety.
The ADAS Debate Continues
Technologies like advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) have matured over the last decade, with many automakers standardizing features like lane departure warnings, lane keeping assistance, collision interventions, blind spot detection, and more.
Aftermarket offerings can strengthen these features. But fleet managers are growing increasingly concerned about overreliance on the technology by drivers.
To put it not so gently, “Drivers rely on it [ADAS] too much and are becoming worse drivers,” Davey Resource Group Fleet Support and Operations Logistics Manager Bob Mossing said. He urges fleet managers to make it clear right off the bat that drivers must always be in control of the vehicle, rather than the other way around.
Peter Goldwasser, executive director of Together for Safer Roads, concurred.
“Vehicle technology should never be considered as a replacement for driver training or awareness,” he stressed.
Drivers should be properly trained in the new technologies as they are installed to best understand how they work.
Mossing said simply using the basic standardized technology that is available on newer vehicles is sufficient in most use cases. This is also what Union Chimique Belge (UCB) Strategic Sourcing Manager Linda Ellis includes on her fleet vehicles.
“Our standard spec includes all of these options because we tend to only offer units that have the basic safety UCB requirement, which is lane assist, back-up camera, car play for hands-free — this is in policy as our commitment to the driver,” she said.
Goldwasser believes that testing and evaluating marketplace products and thinking “out of the box” can advance ADAS use in commercial trucks, which arguably pose a higher safety risk due to their higher threshold for damage in the event of a crash.
Goldwasser noted that it’s important to use technologies that are appropriate for the area in which a truck is operating. For example, he said, a refuse truck in New York City might need a different collision avoidance system setup than a truck that operates cross-country.
AEB Will Be Standard — But Practically Impossible?
In April 2024, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) finalized a rule requiring manufacturers to make automatic emergency braking (AEB) standard in cars and light-duty trucks beginning in 2029.
AEB systems use sensors to detect when a vehicle is close to crashing into a vehicle or pedestrian in front and automatically applies the brakes if the driver has not, according to NHTSA.
The agency projects that the new standard will save at least 360 lives per year and prevent at least 24,000 injuries annually.
Mossing said he supports the new standard but reiterated that drivers must continue to focus on the roadway and drive, rather than rely solely on the technology.
“The downside of this is the cost to repair and the system can fail without the driver knowing. The slightest bump can disable a sensor. A driver might rely on a system that could fail,” Mossing warned.
The Alliance for Automotive Innovation (AAI) contends that fulfilling the rule’s requirements is “practically impossible with available technology.”
In a June 2024 letter to Congress and NHTSA, AAI wrote that “NHTSA’s action will require more costly systems that won’t improve driver or pedestrian safety, which is why we are asking the agency to reopen the proceeding and make these necessary corrections.”
AAI argues that the new systems could result in more rear-end collisions.
Further, NHTSA has investigated complaints regarding AEB as part of Tesla’s Autopilot system. The complaints concern allegations of “phantom braking,” when the AEB system falsely detects an object in the road and brakes unexpectedly with no actual collision threat.
NHTSA is also investigating almost 3 million Honda vehicles for phantom braking, including 2020 to 2022 MY Accord and CR-V models.
Capping Driver Speeds with Intelligent Speed Assist
Intelligent Speed Assist (ISA) is designed to help drivers adhere to speed limits by utilizing global positioning systems (GPS) and pre-loaded speed limit data to either warn drivers when they are exceeding the speed limit or prevent them from doing so.
Passive ISA systems, which provide alerts through audio cues, haptic feedback, or resistance in the accelerator pedal, have become mandatory for all new vehicles in the European Union as of July 2024.
The allows car manufacturers to choose from various forms of feedback, but all systems must activate when a vehicle matches the speed limit for 6 seconds or exceeds it by more than 1.5 seconds. The EU version can be turned off by a driver, but it resets each time a vehicle is restarted.
In early 2024, Washington, D.C. became the first location in the country to adopt legislation that requires ISA technology on cars belonging to drivers convicted in court for criminal violations for aggravated or reckless aggravated driving. Similar legislation was introduced in August 2023 in New York.
While this is not something mandated in all U.S. vehicles, a 2024 survey by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) revealed 60% of U.S. drivers support ISA systems.
Active ISA — or non-overridable ISA — while sometimes more controversial, offers even more promise in saving lives and reducing serious collisions, former New York City Deputy Chief Fleet Officer Eric Richardson believes.
While passive ISA simply warns a driver that they are at or exceeding the speed limit, these active systems will prevent vehicles from exceeding the speed limit or a pre-selected threshold above — or in some cases below — the speed limit.
An active ISA pilot of 50 vehicles in New York City’s fleet revealed fleet drivers complied with speed limits 99% of the time and reduced instances of hard braking by 36%.
“ISA adoption is a game changer when it comes to saving lives on our roads” Richardson said. “Large professional fleets can benefit from ISA in order to reduce serious collisions, not only saving lives and reducing injuries, but also in order to reduce insurance costs and protect their assets.”
Monitoring Drivers Through In-Cab Cameras
Video telematics systems — consisting of both road and driver-facing cameras — first gained traction in trucking fleets, as they’ve proven to mitigate liability and manage driver behaviors. Systems are becoming more common for fleet vehicles of all sizes.
“This technology will allow companies to observe drivers who may be distracted and change that behavior,” Mossing said.
In-cab cameras force drivers to be held accountable for their choices, offering an additional perspective in post-incident monitoring. Mossing believes the use of in-cab cameras will become a standard for fleets over time and says there are more upsides to this technology than downsides.
While some drivers may express privacy concerns, Mossing says cameras are inescapable in today’s society.
“We can’t walk through a city without being on a camera anymore. Having a camera in a company vehicle does not remove a person’s privacy. I am on camera when in the office; the vehicle is an extension of the office. You can limit it by not recording conversations and only reviewing clips that are incident-based,” he suggested.
Backup Cameras and Situational Awareness
Most new vehicles have standardized backup cameras geared toward giving drivers a better perspective of their surroundings. Retrofitting backup cameras to larger fleet vehicles that don’t already have them can be valuable too.
“[It] continues to be an important tool to prevent road crashes,” Goldwasser said. Even with changes to vehicle design [that lead to better visibility for drivers], this is not a zero-sum game. Vehicle technology such as cameras will continue to be important even as drivers have better direct vision.”
However, like all driver assistance technology, they have their limitations.
“They all have a limited field of view, and drivers should still use their mirrors and eyes,” Mossing warned. “Look behind you by turning your head. I hate walking through a parking lot and watching people backing up just looking at their camera.”
Impaired Driving Prevention Technology Could Become Standard in All Vehicles
A major issue commercial fleet managers face is ensuring their drivers aren’t getting behind the wheel while impaired.
In January 2024, NHTSA released an advanced notice of proposed rulemaking that would allow regulators to gather information to develop requirements for advanced drunk and impaired driving prevention technology through a new Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard (FMVSS).
Current technologies are capable of monitoring driver state and performance through recording whether hands are on the steering wheel, where drivers are looking, their lane position, and more.
However, there are challenges with these technologies, like distinguishing between different impairment states, avoiding false positives, and determining appropriate prevention countermeasures if potential impairment is detected.
The initiative is part of a directive from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law for NHTSA to issue a final rule establishing a standard requiring new passenger vehicles to have ‘‘advanced drunk and impaired driving prevention technology’’ by Nov. 2024.
As the comment period closed on the advanced notice, several groups spoke out in favor of — and opposition of — the proposal.
The IIHS also pushed NHTSA to act quickly, with its chief researcher David Zuby writing in a submitted comment, “While the technology to passively detect alcohol-impaired drivers and prevent them from driving is not readily available in the marketplace, a regulatory requirement to equip passenger motor vehicles will inspire the additional effort needed to make it a reality.”
Some advocacy groups expressed concerns about the overcollection and overuse of data.
Consumer Reports urged NHTSA to “move expeditiously” to develop performance requirements for the technology but cautioned the agency that “such a system should be used solely for crash prevention and should be designed and built to inherently protect consumers’ privacy and minimize security vulnerabilities.”
The Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT) echoed the privacy concerns, saying in part “NHTSA should impose strict limits on data collection and use to prevent widespread and government-approved privacy invasions.”
Among CDT’s concerns is that the technologies under consideration to be used to monitor driver state can use cameras to collect data about a driver’s eye movements, facial measurements, and other touch sensors to detect alcohol levels in the blood.
“The data that would be collected by these technologies has long been considered sensitive and private data that warrants greater privacy protections,” the comments continued.
CDT pointed to a controversial law out of Illinois that collected biometric data like fingerprints and facial scans without drivers’ knowledge, leading to major lawsuits against several tech companies. That law was recently amended to hold companies liable for only a single violation per person, rather than for each time biometric data is allegedly misused.
CDT recommended that NHTSA ‘keep pace with current privacy protections and practices to protect against the significant overcollection of car data by ensuring robust privacy protections are in place for data collected and used by advanced impaired driving prevention technologies.’
NHTSA is currently going through the comments made in response to its proposal.
The Bottom Line: Fleet Safety Begins with Training
The foundation of driver safety begins with a solid safety training program. While technology continues to improve and regulations seek to make vehicles safer, fleet managers must take proactive measures to ensure their drivers understand that should be in control of their vehicle.
After receiving proper training, it ultimately comes down to driver responsibility.
“Technology can never be seen as the end all be all for vehicle safety. Drivers and their ability to properly drive, use their mirrors, understand the rules of the road, and avoid behaviors that contribute to collisions is always the most important part of a safety program,” Goldwasser said.
