Interactive Accident Prevention

Current accident statistics show that children and teenagers are frequently involved in accidents as bike riders or pedestrians. Approximately 50 percent of accidents involving child and adolescent cyclists and pedestrians are not caused by them, but by other motorized road users. Raising awareness among children and young people of the potential misconduct of others is therefore essential and can save lives.

At Fraunhofer IVI, experts from the sections of accident research, engineering, and traffic psychology are working together to develop solutions for interactive accident prevention in the future. By combining engineering solutions, data analysis, and psychology-based approaches that focus on people, the increased accident risk of particularly vulnerable road users is brought into sharp focus.

Despite preventive measures, there are still numerous accidents involving fatalities among children and young people. Current training methods do not sufficiently target this group. According to ADAC (2018), around 50 percent of parents are afraid that their children will have an accident or suffer consequential damage in transportation. In fact, parents are increasingly reluctant to let their children participate in road traffic on their own. This delays their development into responsible road users.

COLLISION ZERO is continuing PAPS-XR's vision at the national level. By combining virtual reality technology (VR) with the police's accident type cards (EUSKa), a Germany-wide platform is being created that offers realistic 3D accident simulations based on actual accident data from the immediate vicinity of the target group. This enables schoolchildren to learn not only about general hazards, but also about those specific to their region. The aim is to reduce the number of fatal accidents to zero. To achieve this, COLLISION ZERO relies on 3D replicas. Using 3D map data, real accident locations and accident sequences are modeled and animated. This will enable all raw data provided by the authorities to be visualized throughout Germany and relived live using VR. In addition, an algorithm will identify and evaluate danger zones and accident black spots (e. g., intersections, schools).

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There are various measures aimed at improving the cycling safety of 10- to 14-year-olds. The ERProBt project has developed a comprehensive list of criteria and an exemplary online database for cycling projects. Existing and new projects can now be collected, evaluated, and selected by users. Children, parents, teachers, and educators can find suitable programs and contacts with just a few clicks of the mouse.

To this end, possible criteria were first developed through theory-based literature research and then evaluated in a discussion with experts. To ensure that the criteria are truly relevant for the target group of 10- to 14-year-olds, real accident data from bicycle accidents was also analyzed and included, broken down by age group. Based on these evaluations, the criteria were then weighted. This weighting now ensures, for example, that accident black spots are taken into account in existing cycling projects.