SAFE-UP: Aimsun simulation to test safety of innovative CAV technologies
June 22nd, 2020
Future transport and mobility will be disrupted by innovations in Connected Automated Vehicles (CAVs), in which safety will be of the highest priority. June 1st 2020 was the kick-off for SAFE-UP, which aims to proactively address the upcoming safety challenges by developing innovative technologies, testing and assessment methods.
SAFE-UP is based on 3 key pillars: i) future safety-critical scenarios, ii) new safety technologies, and iii) novel safety assessment methodologies. Future safety-critical scenarios will be designed and analysed in a highly automated and mixed traffic environment in the Aimsun Next traffic simulation platform. Based on these scenarios, new safety technologies for active and passive systems will be developed, resulting in 4 Demos:
- The passive safety system of Demo 1 will include restraint and occupant monitoring technologies for new seating positions. Three active safety system prototypes (all on-vehicle, one of them also including on-user and infrastructure) will be developed.
- Demo 2 will enhance the interaction between vehicles and VRUs under bad weather conditions. Demo 3 will integrate advanced intervention functions to avoid critical events.
- Demo 4 will consist of a safety solution based on C-ITS to enable timely warning provisions.
The SAFE-UP consortium consists of key players in mobility across the entire value chain: advanced OEMs, leading suppliers & industry, and academia. The new technologies will reduce fatalities by covering pedestrians, cyclists and powered two-wheelers in urban areas through active safety systems; it will also reduce fatalities in cars in non-urban areas through passive safety technologies, which will impact 64% of all road fatalities.
Targeted education and training schemes will foster implementation of automated driving functions, while raising awareness of future road safety challenges.
The SAFE-UP project started on June 1st 2020 and will end on May 31st 2023.