What the car industry can do: Mercedes-Benz' view

Abstract

The car industry faces some extreme challenges. Alongside the key task that we face of making individual transport climate-neutral, and alongside the new technological opportunities for communication and networking across our whole environment, it is clear that the user behavior of vehicle drivers and of all other road users is also going to change. Bearing all these aspects in mind, our overriding goal remains to make the traffic on our roads safer. Many of the activities in this context are summarized in the Mercedes-Benz "Vision of accident-free driving." The current plateauing of road fatality statistics across the countries of the West is a clear signal that we need to intensify our efforts even further. And indeed, there are still plenty of levers that can be applied in order to optimize and improve these figures. Following a review of the current situation from the perspective of Mercedes-Benz, the opportunities for further optimization of vehicle safety are now presented in the guise of the latest Experimental Safety Vehicle, ESF 2019, which above all addresses the new possibilities offered by increasing connectivity and automation. Many of the innovative concepts under consideration have a chance of reaching the market in future vehicles, either as they are or in a modified form; in other cases the discussion around them will lead to new ideas and proposed solutions. The Integral Safety Strategy by Mercedes-Benz is a holistic approach that defines safety in four phases: (1) safe driving, (2) assisting in a critical driving situation with accident prevention systems and anticipatory protection elements such as PRE-SAFE® systems, (3) during a crash, for example, occupant and partner protection, and, finally, (4) after a crash, deploy systems for the rescue phase. All four phases must be high priorities during the development of the vehicle. Even with an optimistic view of the vehicle-based opportunities, this chapter will demonstrate that vehicle measures alone will not be sufficient to solve all traffic safety issues, as road transportation is just too complex. All the factors that impact road safety, and which will need to play their part in delivering "Vision Zero," must be addressed; in other words, infrastructural measures and people in traffic, too. As with the Mercedes-Benz strategy of Integral Safety, we shall only be able to make major advances toward "Vision Zero" if all influencing factors are properly investigated as part of an integrated examination of road safety.