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User related assessment of Enhanced Dynamic Pass Predictor (BMW)

Författare

Summary, in English

The aim of the user related assessment was to study perceived advantages, disadvantages, usefulness, trust, acceptance, willingness to have and pay for the driver assistance system: Enhanced Dynamic Pass Predictor developed by BMW within the framework of the SECONDS subproject. Due to restrictions of driving by naïve drivers in real traffic conditions, assessment activities were limited to a demonstration of the function by video and an oral description. Seventeen persons took part in two focus groups, twelve males and five females. At the end of the focus group discussions the participants were asked to individually fill in a short questionnaire with specific questions about the system.

The participants found one of the main advantages of the system that it would help the driver to make a decision when and where to overtake another car. The system would help especially indecisive drivers. They were of the opinion that the system will only be used on rural roads. They stated that it makes no sense to use it in urban areas and on motorways they thought that it hardly will help them. They thought that the risk to be involved in an accident would decrease and the comfort would increase on rural roads, it was the opposite regarding motorways and urban areas. Hardly anybody would use it on motorways or in urban areas. It was expected that it would be an advantage to use the system while driving in the night. The fact that the system could detect other cars and objects earlier than the driver and also knows the characteristic of the road ahead was seen as helpful. The warning signal of the system to warn the driver of an oncoming car, when an overtaking manoeuvre has started was seen as advantage of the system.

As a weakness, the participants stated that not everything can be detected by the system. Especially on rural roads, one will find groups of people who are hiking or a herd of cows. It was stated that the situations where one can use the system are getting less and less frequent. One point mentioned was that most of the people drive anyway according to the limits on rural roads, so that an overtaking manoeuvre would not be necessary or possible. The participants thought that at the moment the costs for such a system would be too high to have it implemented in their own car as well as that in the near future it will only be available in high class cars. They also stated that they would hardly implement the system as a single feature in their car but mentioned that they could imagine to have it implemented together with other systems (like a comfort packages). Bad weather conditions, including, rain, snow or black ice, were mentioned as conditions under which the participants would not use the system. The participants were concerned that the system cannot take these conditions into account and therefore cannot calculate the overtaking manoeuvres correctly.

It was mentioned several times, that drivers can relax more due to the fact that they get the information that it will not be possible to overtake for the next three kilometres. Therefore, they can concentrate also on other things. Also, one does not have to be nervous to find the right moment to overtake and to take any risks. The participants were also of the opinion that the traffic safety would be enhanced while using the system. The warning signal was seen as a good function. Some participants had the opinion that they would trust the system more than their own or their passenger’s judgment of the situation. The head-up display was seen as a good way to inform the driver and it was thought to enhance the safety of the driver.

The participants were of the opinion that it will depend on the driver how the system will be used and that those drivers who already now stay calmly behind another car waiting for the right moment to overtake will do this also when using the system. On the other hand, more aggressive drivers will still keep less distance to the car ahead and just be waiting for the information of the system when to overtake. Furthermore, participants mentioned situations where drivers might not use the system in a wished for way. This might happen intentionally e.g. to show the system that one can overtake even when the system would not recommend it or in an unintentional way when the information reinforce the urge to overtake another car. A participant stated that this might happen in situations when the driver is waiting for system to give him/her the “okay” to overtake and immediately start that overtaking manoeuvre without checking on his/her own if the manoeuvre would be safe.

The participants thought that there might be already too much information with which the driver has to deal with and that this is also getting more difficult and more confusing for the driver. The participants had the fear that they might get overloaded with information and that they might confuse different signals given by different systems. More systems would also mean to spend more time for the drivers to check the different systems and therefore would have their eyes less time on the road. Also, a concern was mentioned that two different systems might give contradictory information to the driver which would confuse the driver and would lead to not trusting the system anymore. A concern was stated that drivers might follow the system information blindly and will not check the situation on their own. Being unsure if the system is updated all the time, it would be necessary for the driver to check every time if it is possible to overtake or not, but it was doubted by the participants that every driver will do this.

The questionnaire answers revealed the following:

While the great majority of the participants had the opinion that the system would decrease the risk to be involved in an accident on rural roads, only two participants agreed (totally) that the system would decrease the risk of an accident on motorways or on urban roads while almost all other participants disagreed with this statement.

The participants thought that the comfort will be mostly enhanced on rural roads (more than three-fourth agreed) and four participants undecided. The disagreement with the statement was highest for motorways (two thirds disagreed) and urban roads (three-fourth disagreed).

Almost half of the participants thought that they would use the system almost every time on rural roads, while one-third stated that they would use the system 40-60% of their driving time on rural roads. A different picture was shown again regarding motorways and urban roads. Only two participants thought they would use the system more than 20% of the driving time on urban roads, while all others stated that they would hardly use the system on such roads. Similarly to that, three-fourth of the participants stated that they would hardly use the system on motorways, while two participants mentioned that they would use it 20-40% of their driving time and one participant each 40-60% and 80-100%.

Eleven participants (more than two-third) stated that they would only be willing to pay 250 Euros to implement the system in their car. Three participants would pay between 250 and 500 and two participants would pay between 250 and 500 Euros. One participant stated that he/she would not be willing to spend any money on the system.

Two third of the participants stated that they would recommend the system to a friend.

Avdelning/ar

Publiceringsår

2013

Språk

Engelska

Dokumenttyp

Rapport

Förlag

InteractIVe Consortium

Ämne

  • Infrastructure Engineering

Status

Published

Report number

SP7 working report