All contents copyright ©, Drive and Stay Alive, Inc., 2003 onwards, unless specified otherwise. All rights reserved.

IMPORTANT: click here to read the DISCLAIMER

The European Union plans to reduce accidents by

half with eSafety concept --

Active safety systems are the key to success

January 27, 2004

According to an EU survey, active safety systems in automotive vehicles have the greatest potential for a dramatic increase in road safety. However, the top EU priority in traffic policy, that is to halve the number of fatal accidents in road traffic by the year 2010, can only be achieved with a high degree of application. Bosch is also aiming at the same goal, this is why in a great number of activities it tries to generate a better understanding of the benefits offered by the Electronic Stability Program (ESP). Car dealers are offered training courses and information material from the automotive supplier as well as organized driving tests to test the brake control system.

Every year, 1.3 million accidents occur on European roads. Some 40,000 people die in them, and 1.7 million suffer injuries. The damage to the national economies as a consequence of these accidents is estimated at about 160 billion euro by the EU, which corresponds to 2 percent of the gross domestic product. The working group eSafety with experts from the automotive industry and other groups concerned has come up with a concept which includes recommendations intended to help reach the specified goal. Together with the implementation of clearly outlined legal framework conditions and the removal of social and business obstacles, the installing of innovative safety systems in cars is considered to be the most promising approach for a dramatic improvement of the present situation. The Electronic Stability Program is specifically mentioned in this context. It detects skidding movements of the car when they first set in – and counteracts them by reducing the engine output and additionally braking down individual wheels, thus keeping the car on track. This support is essential, because a study by the general association of the German insurance industry GDV revealed that 25 percent of all accidents with bodily injuries and 60 percent of all fatal accidents are due to skidding. In the meantime, other studies also confirm the effectiveness of ESP. By assessing about one million accidents with bodily injuries, Toyota arrives at the conclusion that ESP as standard equipment in cars would have the capacity of reducing the number of serious accidents by half.

Erkki Liikanen, member of the European Commission and responsible for Enterprise and the Information Society, mentioned another aspect at the 10th ITS world congress (Intelligent Transport Systems) in Madrid which is of great impact: the driver as such. Liikanen is convinced that the driver is the one to profit most from the effect of safety systems, however, the benefits need to be better explained to him. This point of view is confirmed by a representative survey commissioned by Bosch and including 1,000 car drivers in Germany. It arrives at the same conclusion that people show an enormous interest in car safety, but the actual knowledge of the systems' benefits is very small. This is one more reason why Bosch is going to try even harder in its efforts to generate a greater awareness and understanding of the benefits of active safety systems.

[Source:  Robert Bosch GmbH]