Robot SMIDSY? Can self driving vehicles see motorcycles?
MAG Wants assurances that motorcyclists will be safe when self driving cars are allowed on the roads, some as soon as next year!
Apparently yellow is a very good colour for visibility, these Brighton Burn Up visitors have the right idea!
MAG, The Motorcycle Action Group, has expressed deep concern at the government's plans to roll out self driving vehicle technology as soon as next year and is holding them to account by asking them to prove that self driving cars are safe for motorcyclists.
EuroNCAP testing of detection and reaction to motorcycles is only itself scheduled to start in 2023 which seems tardy compared to the self driving tech roll out. On the face of it putting something out there and in use on the roads, at the same time as it is being tested for safety, does not sound logical or safe, and MAG wants real proof that motorcyclists will not therefore be put at risk.
Grant Schapps, Transport Secretary has revealed that self driving vehicles will be rolled out on UK roads by 2025, with some vehicles with built-in self driving tech out there as soon as 2023.
It was announced in October 2021 that EuroNCAP's testing of Autonomous Emergency Braking and Lane Support Systems and their efficacy in detecting motorcycles while in use, would commence in 2023.
MAG has been worried for a long time that automatic detection systems in modern cars do not necessarily pick motorcycles up. Research by RDW (the Netherlands Vehicle Authority) in 2016 found that cars with for example, adaptive cruise control, did notice motorcycles on the whole but when they were riding at the edge of the lane (for example while filtering) the cruise control did not react to them and the driver had to intervene to protect the motorcyclist.
Neil Liversidge, MAG Chair, said:
“It is a source of great concern that – once again – the interests of motorcyclists are an afterthought. Years of development of these systems have not taken sufficient care of motorcyclists’ interests. Whilst the elimination of driver error may be a laudable goal, it is of no interest if that error is simply replaced by automatic incompetence. We will be holding the Government and authorities to account and demanding to see genuine evidence that these vehicles will not place riders at higher risk than human drivers do. Given that independent testing is yet to commence, I find it hard to understand how the Minister can be so confident that the roll-out is sensible at this time.”
It is good that motorcyclists have groups like MAG to look out for their interests and give the government checks and balances as they legislate to allow increasing amounts of tech out on the roads.
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