This conference slide presentation, accompanying the paper of the same title, describes the activities of the FIA Foundation and European legislation to improve safety aspects of vehicle design. The FIA Foundation works on international projects supporting international strategies for road safety and accident prevention. Recent progress in passive safety is shown. Efforts are being made to improve pedestrian protection, involving road user education and changes to vehicles and infrastructure. Another area of safety research is in compatibility, to protect both vehicles in a collision where different vehicle sizes are involved. Active safety measures include the use of intelligent transport systems (ITS) for crash avoidance and post-crash responses. The European Union launched the eSafety Initiative in 2001 to bring together stakeholders and public authorities, and encourage further research and development and international co-operation on standards. Safety systems based on ITS technology need to be carefully validated before being put into use. For the covering abstract see ITRD E121172.
Samenvatting