Has the time come for "Black Boxes" in cars?

Aquavid

There is an awful lot said about the weekly horrific accidents on Irish roads, and much speculation as to the causes, but in many cases, especially where the drivers are killed, nothing approaching certainty as to what actually happened.

Drink? Fatigue? Speed? Carelessness? All factors, but in which accidents, and to what extent?

I personally believe that with advances in technology, reductions in cost, and the crying need for answers to these questions, the time has come to consider the incorporation of aircraft-style "black box" recorders into new cars.

Digital recording has already made such devices much cheaper and more robust (hence the fact that with CCTV for example, Dublin Bus now has 10 working recording cameras on every bus in the fleet instead of 3 cameras on 5% of the fleet in the analogue days).

The systems would be much less complex and need less impact protection than aircraft systems, thus would be less expensive, and the cost overall in terms of a new car need not be prohibitive.

What I would suggest would be a system which recorded 24 hours rolling data from:

* a behind front grille mounted mini-camera

* data record of control inputs: steering wheel movement, accelerator, brake, clutch, indicator, engine speed and road speed.

These units would be sealed and mounted on the chassis in a central part of the car.

Legislation would enable Gardai removal and analysis in the event of a notifiable accident: i.e. one involving injury or death to any person.

In any of these accidents, it would then be possible to see the position of the car(s) on the road in the leadup to the accident, and the control inputs from the driver in the accident sequence, and pattern of driving in the time leading up to the accident.

The data gained would be incalculably valuable in road safety terms, knowing exactly what caused the accidents, and in prosecutions.

I know that were this to be introduced for new build cars, it would be many years before the majority of cars had such systems, but to be honest, you have to start somewhere. And gradually the number of cars not fitted would reduce to small numbers.

I can understand that people may have a bit of a "big brother" fear with this, but if legislated correctly, so that the replay was only available in case of accidents causing injury or death, the good outweighs the bad doesn't it?

Aquavid

Chris_533976

I would spend the money to be invested in that on the shocking state of driver education in the country and the fast-tracking of national route upgrades.

I know I sound like a broken record with this, but having MANDATORY driving lessons followed by a test and eliminating the whole idea of a provisional licence person driving a car home having failed the test. (And getting rid of a provisional licence driver completely)

Finishing DCing the interurbans and the semi-interurbans (eg Limerick - Galway) will stop people taking stupid risks to pass a tractor on a disgracefully windy S2 national route road.

Also, more random breath testing.

Then the number of accidents will plummett

seamus

I would be skeptical about the reliability of said boxes. No-one is going to maintain their black box. Sure, it could be tested in the NCT, but between those times no-one would bother. So you'd have a high incidence of recorders which have become damaged or disconnected. Cameras (which in all reality are going to be the only really useful source of information in terms of figuring out the circumstances of the crash) would easily become filthy and misaligned.

There would also be very little to prevent people removing their black boxes and fiddling with them.

These two issues don't really arise with planes because pilots don't feel like they're being spied on for the purposes of extracting money from them.

I can see manufacturers and retailers adding €1k onto the cost of a new car to cover this. As Chris says, this is overkill and attempting to find new solutions to a problem which arises from lack of enforcement.

MrPudding

Aquavid wrote:

.........but if legislated correctly........

Aquavid

Yes, and Ireland has such a good reputation for legislating correctly. It would be a disaster.

Like Chris_533976 I would prefer to see the money going elsewhere. Initially to reduce the current waiting lists so that we could have a system as outlined by chris. I would also like to see the money, assuming there was any left, used to balance the deficit left by removing VAT & VRT from things like ASP, extra airbags etc.

MrP

Capt'n Midnight

Dubai has GPD on most cars now.
the UK will most likely introduce it on all new cars within the next five years - for motorway tolling

sdanseo

Chris_533976 wrote:

I would spend the money to be invested in that on the shocking state of driver education in the country and the fast-tracking of national route upgrades.

I know I sound like a broken record with this, but having MANDATORY driving lessons followed by a test and eliminating the whole idea of a provisional licence person driving a car home having failed the test. (And getting rid of a provisional licence driver completely)

Finishing DCing the interurbans and the semi-interurbans (eg Limerick - Galway) will stop people taking stupid risks to pass a tractor on a disgracefully windy S2 national route road.

Also, more random breath testing.

Then the number of accidents will plummett

Crap drivers + black boxes

OR

Good drivers and no need for black boxes...

They wouldn't prevent accidents...with aircraft its incredibly rare, whereas 95% of car accidents are due to human error.

Gurgle

Chris_533976 wrote:

I would spend the money to be invested in that on the shocking state of driver education in the country

This idea of 'driver education' is flapped around these boards on every thread related to road safety. Its complete bollox tbh. The vast majority of drivers in this country know perfectly well how to drive properly, they just don't do it.

Chris_533976 wrote:

I know I sound like a broken record with this, but having MANDATORY driving lessons

See that brought in and we'll have driving instructors making more money than GPs for an atrocious service. There are good instructors and there are pointless wastes of time. I have taught 3 ppl to drive in the last 10 years - and all 3 passed their test first time and have never had an accident between them. All 3 had had lessons from 'professionals' and found them to be demeaning and unhelpful.
There is nothing complicated about driving a car properly, it doesn't require professional instruction. Especially when many of the so-called instructors are complete twats. Teaching someone to drive is just telling them what controls do what and when to look in the mirrors, then patiently sitting in the car with them while they practise.

Chris_533976 wrote:

stop people taking stupid risks to pass a tractor on a disgracefully windy S2 national route road.

Nothing will stop people taking stupid risks short of certain knowledge that they will be held accountable for any consequences of their actions.

The black-box is a good idea, and would be a step in the right direction.

I think one factor which could dramatically increase peoples awareness is in how accidents are reported.

'The van left the road and struck a tree' gives the impression of mechanical failure.

How about 'The driver of the van having drunk 4 pints missed a turn at 100kph and killed himself and 2 of his passengers who were sitting in the cargo area without seats or seatbelts'.

I know its an old Irish tradition not to speak badly of the dead. At a paedophile's funeral you'll hear about how he fought his demons, not about how he screwed up peoples' lives.

But in something as important as road-safety, the message has to be given plainly and bluntly.

Sure, we can look up statistics on what percentage of fatal accidents had alcohol or speed as a factor but aren't we inclined to assume 'alcohol' as meaning the driver was so pissed he could barely walk, or 'speed' as 160kph on a donkey track.

Heres one from saturday:
http://www.breakingnews.ie/archives/story.asp?j=232087550&p=z3zx88365&n=232088436&archive=11/11/2006

The 16-year-old girl was driving the car that left the road and crashed in to a tree near the front gate of Glenstal Abbey in Murroe...
It's believed the three had been attending a party in Murroe and were returning to the village when the crash occurred

No mention of the fact that at 16 she couldn't have had a license or insurance, did she steal the car?, was she drunk?, what speed was she doing?

And just how exactly would mandatory lessons have prevented this?

SeanW

I agree with many of the above points. Black boxes won't PREVENT road deaths. It'll just make the investigation easier after the fact.

I don't see how mandatory lessons would help because if you can learn to drive in other ways (like taught by parents or whatever) and has been alluded to above, some drivng instructors are wonderful while others are pure crap. I know that from somewhat recent experience. Personally I think everyone who wishes to become a safe driver should get lessons from a good professional, but I can't see what making it mandatory would do.

with regard to the provisional license I agree it's a bit of a farce but then again we have a driver testing system with waiting lists and times so long that the system has effectively collapsed so there's ludicrosity all around.

However I would not go so far as to blame the provisonal licensing system (or lack of it) for the road deaths, that is a regulatory/bureacratic failure. Nor the bad roads because we ALL know they are there and as such should drive/allocate time accordingly.

I also agree with the points about reporting - some of these reports dress up the circumstances like the whole thing is the car/van/vehicles fault (like "so and so died when the car they were driving left the road at 2AM ...")

People need to get it into their heads that stupid driving kills. Common sense should prevail but far too often it does not. It doesn't matter whether you're a provisonal licenseholder (who's probably waiting for a test) or some so-called experienced driver with a full license that's driven like a mad thing for 30 years. I think stupidity on the roads is universal and it transcends stereotypical groups.

RedPlanet

I would be a big supporter of this.
Blackboxes already exist in some cars:
http://www.cbc.ca/consumers/market/files/cars/blackboxes/
However i don't think we need the camera as in the OP.
It woud require maintence and can be made fairly redundant with other technology.
Blackboxes should communicate via wireless to other Blackboxes within a 50m radius.
This way after an accident the Gards or Insurance people can find out the identity of other motorists nearby, can contact them and get a statement about the accident, if they saw it or not.
If accompanied with GPS technology the BB's may also curtail car theft.

Check this out from that linked article:

Eric Gauthier was convicted of dangerous driving causing death. His car struck and killed 19-year-old Yacine Zinet. There were no witnesses to the accident except the black box in Gauthier’s 2001 Sunfire. Police got the data and it showed Gauthier was doing more than 150 kph in a 50 zone - and that he never hit the brakes.

I'd say pressure the insurance industry to make these mandatory.
Let motorists pay for their installment.

r3nu4l

Yep, a camera is probably unworkable but a data recorder would be very good. As Cap'n Midnight pointed out there will be mile-for-mile tolling in the UK in the near future so adding a few more sensors to record speed, accelerator, clutch and brake use is no harm.

That said...I can see that having this equipment in your car will provide temptation for the Government to introduce automatic speeding penalties in the future as well.

Gurgle

r3nu4l wrote:

this equipment in your car will provide temptation for the Government to introduce automatic speeding penalties in the future as well.

That would be terrible :rolleyes:
Of course we should get off our arses and protest against the miles of speed trap roads on each motorway with 50km/h speed limits but its easier to sit back and complain.

r3nu4l

Gurgle wrote:

That would be terrible :rolleyes:
Of course we should get off our arses and protest against the miles of speed trap roads on each motorway with 50km/h speed limits but its easier to sit back and complain.

Hee hee, you misinterpreted my post. My point was that because the temptation undoubtably exists, people will resist any moves to place black boxes in cars simply because of this risk...not that it would be a terrible thing :rolleyes: Less point scoring from you and more contribution please Mr. Gurgle

What motorways have 50 km/h limits then? I thought the limit on Motorways was 120 km/h? Maybe if there are roadworks going on there is a 50 limit but I doubt there is any stretch of motorway in Ireland with a 50 km/h limit otherwise.

As for sitting back and complaining...you assume too much Mr. Gurgle-person, when I lived at home in Ireland I wrote to several politicians and my local Gardaí complaining about the 'fish-in-a-barrell' speed traps on a local section of our dual carriageway pointing out that there was another stretch of road much less travelled but with far higher deaths recorded less than a mile away! Of course, I got some mealy mouthed replies but last time I was home the boys in blue were out again on the same stretch of dual carriageway clocking up the money for the exchequer

Gurgle

r3nu4l wrote:

What motorways have 50 km/h limits then? I thought the limit on Motorways was 120 km/h?

'They' (The twits in charge) have a habit of making the last 3 miles of any decent road a 50km/h zone as the road approaches a town. Take a spin to Dundalk for a prime example.
To cater for people with no brakes?
Or to make a nice handy trap?

r3nu4l wrote:

As for sitting back and complaining...you assume too much Mr. Gurgle-person, when I lived at home in Ireland I wrote to several politicians and my local Gardaí complaining about the 'fish-in-a-barrell' speed traps on a local section of our dual carriageway pointing out that there was another stretch of road much less travelled but with far higher deaths recorded less than a mile away!

Well done you!
I was referring more to myself.:D

sinbadfury

Any 'data' that can be collected about how people behave in their cars can help understand the causes of accidents.
But it is the 'real' motive behind collecting this data that has to be considered. You assume that the people running this country and the major road related industries (tolling, insurance etc) have any other interest than making as much money as possible. While a good idea in theory, I believe the data would be used for further ways to screw the ordinary joe. Roads would not be improved fast enough and the insurance companies would ahve more 'data' in order to pigeon-hole drivers and increase premiums.

As for driver education and ordinary people 'teaching' people how to drive.
A bad driver might never crash but that doesnt mean that they are not doing anything wrong.
At the end of the day there are so many parameters in an accident that you cant really put it down to one action of one driver, most of the time. To maybe take it too far, a person deciding to go/not go to the toilet before they leave for work might inadvertantly decide if they are in a certain postion to be involved/cause a crash?