Safe Speed Forums

A Doctor I work with went to a conference meeting recently and a man there representing BMW mentioned something quite interesting. The rep told him of a system which is already being manufactured for future use. I wish I’d had longer to dicuss it with him but in brief this is how Dr X described it to me..

In future all vehicles will have a unique I.D, like an IP address, and when it ‘sees’ two vehicles on a possible collision path it puts the brakes on and the lights can flash and sound the horn of the vehicle. I assume this works in conjunction with GPS?

I’m trying to dig deeper on this but after a few various web searches none of the keywords I have used have come up with anything yet. I can see the use and abuse of such a system but, in Dr X’s words, “you could see the last of many accidents under this system” (SMIDSY). I don’t know if it’s reliable and safe, and the way forward, or more Big Brother.

Is this old news or a new scoop I shouldn’t have mentioned? I think something like this has been mentioned here before but I haven't heard it quite in these terms AFAICR.

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

I have seen or heard of similar-ish systems and some previous discussion regarding them has occurred previously on here.
This one is a 'take' I would say on a variety of possibles that exist in R&D at the moment.
I think if it is a 'reaction' device to help guide or warn immediate vicinity vehicles, then it might be of some benefit, but if it in any way removes responsibility away from the motorist then it is unlikely to really be of real use other than perhaps to the lowest 25% of motorists.
If it tracks the vehicle then yep, that questions the right to privacy and so on.

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Safe Speed for Intelligent Road Safety through proper research, experience & guidance.

Both my cars have a system for identifying other cars and avoiding them on the road. It's called the driver.

Actually, the X5 already has Internet connectivity so, presumably it has a unique address.

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

There's a huge amount of R&D going on at present with vehicle-to-vehicle communications. Not just for the reasons you cite but also things like traffic congestion warnings, so that the sat-nav in the following vehicle can then re-calculate a more efficient route. Basically, vehicles will be able to communicate to others in the vicinity. It's exciting (and slightly scary!) stuff that I'm not really involved in. Who knows, maybe you'll be able to buy an "app" that communicates the presence of a scam van to following vehicle (purely to assist them in the scam partnership's stated aim of staying within the speed limit, you understand)!

I'm sure we'll get the usual arguments about removing control from the driver, but we've been having those ever since the ignition advance control was taken off the lever on the steering wheel! Without knowing much about it, I imagine that such systems won't be released until the manufacturers are confident that they're not going to get their butts sued - which probably means better than 99.99 (and maybe another 9!) % of drivers. Ultimately, provided they stick to a particular and very specific task, we just have to face up to the fact that the machines are better than we are (which is why they banned various electronic aids in F1). I know I'm certainly not as good as the average F1 driver!

My bigger fear is that there will be "unintended consequences" (say, for example, insurers offering discounts for drivers of such vehicles, which will then gradually morph into insurers artificially loading premiums if you don't have such equipment and then possibly even refusing to pay out if you've disabled it...

...leading it it becoming a legal requirement not to disable it...

...and so on.

Yes, I thought so too Claire but wasn't sure if it was quite the same thing we’d discussed before. Since the Doc only goes to places where new and cutting edge things are discussed I wasn’t sure if this was one of them.

I'm sure we said something like it would be quite dangerous if there wasn't some kind of override so that the driver can ultimately take/regain control and responsibility. So I was surprised to hear that this isn't at R&D stage but already being fitted with a view to "being trailed soon”. (That was the other thing I forgot to say he mentioned sorry.

I can't interrogate the Doc more today but I'll try again later, unless someone has a link to this new innovation from BMW. I hope I haven’t spilt any secret beans.

This probably isn't so far removed from a law which forces us to keep a phone which tracks our every movement; not just in a car. Maybe even an implant from birth one day.

Add: Just read your post Mole

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

The Doc did specifically say, and refer to it as "like an IP address for cars". I find all this worrying. I thought this was a long way away yet..

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

Does that include pedal cycles? Or are cyclists regarded as adequately safeguarded by wearing a plastic box on their head?

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When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
When I see a youth in a motor car I do d.c.brown

Certainly not, Since you will be required to implant an identity and tracking chip in your body (either under the skin of your forehead or in the palm of your right hand # ) this will allow the system to identify cyclists and pedestrians as well as motorised vehicles...

All in the interests of your personal safety and welfare of course...


(# Said chip will also act as transaction identity, without it you will obviously be unable to buy or sell anything... )

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"The road to a police state is paved with public safety legislation"

I would hope not Mole because, just like with speeding convictions, if it smell like BS they shouldn’t load your premium if your driving history is great.

Of course the other choice drivers may make, (well I would), is to buy an older car without this technology. I know many people who already drive older cars precisely because of the ridiculous complexity, service costs and expense of anything that goes wrong on modern ones.

I think I can see a potential danger, although I’m sure they’re ahead of me. How would such a system cope when it’s trying to interfere with your driving when you may need to brake or accelerate hard or steer a different course to prevent hitting a pedestrian or object, when this system only sees objects it can identify? Couldn’t there be a conflict of ‘interest’ as it were?

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

I'm not familiar with this particular system, so the following is a complete guess, but I imagine it wouldn't act on steering, so you wouldn't get into a "fight" with it in that respect. I would take over throttle and brakes (like Electronic Stability Control and Brake Assist already does on many cars). I've yet to be in a situation where I can honestly say that accelerating hard would have avoided a particular situation - in fact, if it were generally true, low powered cars would be over-represented in the KSI stats (and actually, I think the opposite is true)! Even supercars can't accelerate as hard as they can brake! I think we've already head "intervention" technologies like radar which senses when you're too close to the car in front and backs off the throttle and / or applies the brakes and I'm pretty sure we'd have heard about it if such features caused accidents. I recently drove a Merc with a (driver-controlled) speed limiter. I have to say it was pretty handy down a long SPECS-controlled 50 limit too. I tried playing with it (because it was a new toy!) and found that I didn't die horribly when I reached it. It was just like driving my wife's old 850 Mini - you very quickly alter your driving style so you don't bother trying to overtake things doing 60! Of course, the argument about boredon is a separate one and I'd never advocate mandatory speed limiters for that reason, but I don't see any of thos as a problem for safe car control. My misgivings are only to do with lack of freedom and the possibility that some driving skills will atrophy, leading to a sort of vicious circle whereby the more the car does for you, the less the driver bothers trying, so he looses those skills, so the car has to take over even more tasks...and so on. I imagine they will have armies of people working on their safety case analysis (sadly, probably more lawyers than engineers!) but I doubt there will be a net increase in accidents on vehicles so-equipped.

For the record, by the way, my own car is 22 years old this month and I love it because I drive IT (not the other way round). Hell, it doesn't even beep at me if I don't want to wear my seat belt! I do, of course, but I like it (and everything else that I do in a car!) to be MY decision! (and yes, I can fix it too!) so I know exactly where you're coming from. That said, I know I'd rather be in my compan ycar in a crash, any day. sadly, my poxy 1.6 diesel Eurobox company car also out-handles my own 3 litre petrol car and if I ever wanted to get anyhere in a harry, I know which car would be the more able point-to-point!