As thousands of visitors drop by at Darb El Saai this week to have a look at the activities led by the General Traffic Directorate within the Ministry of the Interior, a variety of voices are uniting in encouraging positive road behaviours in Qatar at the GCC Traffic Week 2016.
The GCC Traffic Week is a key part of Qatar’s commitment to improving road safety and encouraging positive behaviours as part of the National Road Safety Strategy 2013-2022. Among many such important voices, Thierry Sabbagh, Managing Director, Ford Middle East, shared with Community his point of view:
Poor decision-making on the road is a killer. Literally. The UAE’s Ministry of Interior (MoI) last week revealed the top causes of traffic-related accidents, deaths and injuries in the country, and you could argue that poor decision-making has a hand in the majority of incidences.
From erratic lane-changing and sudden swerving, to not leaving enough distance to the car in front, and even things as simple as entering a road without checking if the way is clear, or having no lane discipline, contribute to the large number of road accidents that motivate the continued launching of impressive campaigns such as GCC Gulf Traffic Week.
At the launch of 2015’s Gulf Traffic Week, undersecretary at the UAE’s Ministry of Interior, Lt. Gen. Saif al-Shafar, said: “We are hoping to be the world’s safest country on the road, with road fatalities of no more than three per cent, in about five years.” It’s a tall order, but undoubtedly achievable if we can get everybody on the same page.
According to a study conducted by the National Safety Council in the US, writing a text message takes about five seconds of the driver’s sight from the road. That equates to a distance the length of a football field when driving at a speed of only 88 km/h, which is terrifying to think about. But this is a decision that drivers are willingly making, which has brought rise to this year’s theme for Traffic Week: “Your Decision Determines Your Fate.”
Driverless technology, even in its infancy, brings occupant safety to the centre of motoring focus. And while full autonomy could possibly be as little as five years away, it’s the technology that we already have incorporated that will be at its core.
Potentially life-altering, at least in terms of driving, is the likes of Ford’s Driver Alert System and Lane-Keeping System, and this is where the distracted driver really benefits. Detecting signs of fatigue, a car that provides a warning on the instrument cluster can be a life-saving machine.
The same can be said of alerting drivers who unintentionally drift from their lane; when influenced with a gentle steering assist, the chance of collision with a vehicle in another lane is greatly reduced. And let’s not forget Adaptive Cruise Control, which, with Ford, now comes with Collision Warning and Brake Support technology that uses sensors to detect when the car is approaching a slow-moving vehicle and adjusts cruise control accordingly.
Top of the list when it comes to driver assist technologies that change our habits is SYNC with MyFord Touch, which allows a driver to stay connected to his world and interact with vehicle systems via voice control, a touch screen tap or a conventional button. Both SYNC and MyFord Touch help reduce the potential for driver distraction through voice-controlled functionality, meaning drivers can keep hands on the wheel and eyes on the road.
We can’t change a driver’s belief in why it’s wrong to use a phone while driving, but we can make it safer for other road users. It’s frightening to think that despite the sheer number of accidents on our roads, some people still opt to risk it all to read a text message or check the latest on social media, and our goal for the future must be zero automotive-related fatalities.
Though the day will come when we have the ability to not pay any real attention to the road when travelling by car, we shouldn’t get ahead of ourselves. We need to accept the technologies we have in the here and now for what they are: driver aids.
Consider, perhaps, one of the most important developments in the automotive industry from recent times, Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC). It’s the prequel to the likes of V2V (vehicle-to-vehicle) and V2I (vehicle-to-infrastructure), which is your car “speaking” to other cars, buildings and obstructions around to dictate when to slow down, accelerate, or manoeuvre. With your vehicle holding the ACC intelligence to maintain speed and keep distance from the car in front without so much as a depression of the brake, it inevitably changes the way you approach driving, changes your habits, bringing a greater level of comfort due to not needing razor-sharp awareness.
Taking more control, or responsibility, even, from your hands, there’s the exceptionally smart technology like Active Park Assist that provides steering assistance to park the vehicle in a parallel or reverse perpendicular parking spot, and pull out from tight parallel parking spots. This is technology that also includes side park distance control. As a driver, you control brake, accelerate, and move the shifter. Again, it adds a level of calm to your driving, negating the need to size up a parking space or worry about slotting between the lines.
The focus on key messages from GCC Gulf Traffic Week includes: the importance of seatbelts, risk of exceeding speed limits, and, crucially, using mobile phones when driving. If we have to take it in stages, let us aim for no road fatalities due to driver distraction, and the addition of these technologies can only help. It may not be a solution, but it’s a pretty good start.