Driver's Perspective Research Articles

Attending overtaking cars and motorcycles through the mirrors before changing lanes

Right of way violation crashes are the most common type of accidents that motorcyclists face. This study assessed right of way decisions in scenarios which require noticing whether there is traffic from behind that is about to overtake. A test was created which presents participants clips with a wide field of vision (from a driver's perspective in a moving vehicle), with mirror information inset that allows either cars or motorcycles that are about to overtake, to be attended. Novice and experienced car drivers, and dual drivers (with both car and motorcycle experience), watched these clips while their eye movements were monitored. The results indicated that in the rear-view and the right-side mirrors, and in the right hand lane, conflicting motorcycles garnered more attention than conflicting cars. This pattern however was particularly driven by the dual drivers group. Additionally, novice drivers and dual drivers made more use of the right side mirror than the experienced drivers. Dual drivers also made more use of the rear view mirror than experienced drivers. Finally, significant positive correlations that were found between percentages of safe manoeuvres and measures of visual search provide direct evidence demonstrating that the frequency of risky manoeuvres was indeed larger in those cases where less time was spent gazing at the mirrors, indicating that the additional attention devoted to process conflicting vehicles contributes to reduce risky manoeuvres. The general pattern of results also provides some indirect support that non-motorcyclists drivers are more likely to have Look But Fail To See errors with conflicting motorcycles than motorcyclist drivers.

Assessment of drivers' ability to anticipate traffic hazards after traumatic brain injury

ObjectivesThe aim of this study was to examine the effect of traumatic brain injury (TBI) on drivers' ability to anticipate traffic hazards. Slower anticipation of hazards has been associated with...

Evaluation of the Visibility of Workers’ Safety Garments during Nighttime Highway-Maintenance Operations

To reduce traffic congestion in the United States, roadway maintenance and construction operations are widely performed during nighttime hours. This makes visibility a critical issue as workers need to be visible to oncoming traffic and heavy equipment operators in order to ensure their safety. A variety of high-visibility safety garments are available to increase the visibility of workers at night. The study presented in this paper assesses some of these garments from the perspective of drivers. The approach adopted includes the design of a field test setup in which eight safety garment assemblies were displayed in a replicated maintenance work zone. A video was created for each safety garment assembly being worn by workers to capture the approaching view of a driver entering the work zone. The videos were shown to drivers, who evaluated the visibility of the garments in pairwise comparisons. Two random effects binary probit models were estimated. One model was used to understand the characteristics that...

Exploring Eye Movements in Patients with Glaucoma When Viewing a Driving Scene

BackgroundGlaucoma is a progressive eye disease and a leading cause of visual disability. Automated assessment of the visual field determines the different stages in the disease process: it would be desirable to link these measurements taken in the clinic with patient's actual function, or establish if patients compensate for their restricted field of view when performing everyday tasks. Hence, this study investigated eye movements in glaucomatous patients when viewing driving scenes in a hazard perception test (HPT).Methodology/Principal FindingsThe HPT is a component of the UK driving licence test consisting of a series of short film clips of various traffic scenes viewed from the driver's perspective each containing hazardous situations that require the camera car to change direction or slow down. Data from nine glaucomatous patients with binocular visual field defects and ten age-matched control subjects were considered (all experienced drivers). Each subject viewed 26 different films with eye movements simultaneously monitored by an eye tracker. Computer software was purpose written to pre-process the data, co-register it to the film clips and to quantify eye movements and point-of-regard (using a dynamic bivariate contour ellipse analysis). On average, and across all HPT films, patients exhibited different eye movement characteristics to controls making, for example, significantly more saccades (P<0.001; 95% confidence interval for mean increase: 9.2 to 22.4%). Whilst the average region of ‘point-of-regard’ of the patients did not differ significantly from the controls, there were revealing cases where patients failed to see a hazard in relation to their binocular visual field defect.Conclusions/SignificanceCharacteristics of eye movement patterns in patients with bilateral glaucoma can differ significantly from age-matched controls when viewing a traffic scene. Further studies of eye movements made by glaucomatous patients could provide useful information about the definition of the visual field component required for fitness to drive.

Visibility of Tractor Trailer Reflective Strips at Small Viewing Angles in Collision Reconstruction

In collision reconstruction of nighttime accidents, the conspicuity of hazards from a driver's perspective is a critical factor. When the collision involves large commercial vehicles, the visibility of the reflective strips is essential in assessing avoidance. Reflective strips on commercial vehicles are generally consistent from vehicle to vehicle and are highly reflective between perpendicular and 45° viewing angles. However, at shallower viewing angles (closer to parallel viewing), which occurs when trailers begin turns, the reflective strips may not be effective. In this initial study, the effectiveness of reflective strips at shallow viewing angles (‘entrance angles’ of 45° to 90°) was examined under a variety of test conditions including high beams and viewing distances of up to 150 m. The results indicated that at entrance angles of less than 70°, reflective strips are highly effective warnings from a human factors perspective. At entrance angles of more than 75°, reflective strips are ineffective. From 70° to 75°, the results were sensitive to the test parameters. This study does not address the visibility of the tractor or other aspects of nighttime visibility. Further research is recommended to extend this study to greater viewing distances, xenon headlights, ‘dirty’ vs. ‘cleaned’ reflective strips, and wet roads, with particular attention to entrance angles of 70° to 75°.

Drivers' Behavioral Decision-Making at Signalized Intersection with Countdown Display Unit

Abstract Countdown display unit at signalized intersection is one of the most commonly used, but also controversial traffic control equipments. From the perspective of drivers' psychology, the drivers' behavioral decision-making process and its influence factors were analyzed. Based on the dates surveyed, the Logistic model of drivers' behavioral decision-making at signalized intersection with countdown display unit was established, which was also compared with the model without countdown display unit. The sensitivity analysis results of these two models were given at last. The results indicated that the countdown display influenced the drivers' behavioral decision-making significantly. These fundamental works provided some knowledge to traffic management to accelerate the process in the improvement of countdown display setting and gave some advices to promote the safety of intersections.

Hazard perception in novice and experienced drivers: The effects of sleepiness

One driver skill that has been found to correlate with crash risk is hazard perception ability. The purpose of this study was to investigate how hazard perception latencies change between high and low sleepiness for a high risk group (novice drivers) and a lower risk group (experienced drivers). Thirty-two novice drivers (aged 17–24 years) and 30 experienced drivers (aged 28–36) completed a validated video-based hazard perception test, in which participants were asked to anticipate genuine traffic conflicts in footage filmed from the driver's perspective, with separate groups tested at either 10 a.m. (lower sleepiness) or at 3 a.m. (higher sleepiness). We found a significant interaction between sleepiness and experience, indicating that the hazard perception skills of the more experienced drivers were relatively unaffected by mild increases in sleepiness while the inexperienced drivers were significantly slowed. The findings suggest that the disproportionate sleepiness-related accident involvement of young, inexperienced drivers could be partly due to a slowing of their ability to anticipate traffic hazards.

Analysis and Modeling of Automobile Users’ Perceptions of Quality of Service on Urban Streets

Modeling travelers’ perception of service quality is an emerging research area in surface transportation. The first national effort to study automobile drivers’ perceptions is NCHRP Project 3-70. The study was developed in response to agencies’ needs to understand which factors enter into users’ perception of quality of service and the interaction between modes on urban streets. This paper describes the research efforts taken to analyze and model automobile level of service (LOS) from the driver's perspective. A data collection approach using video laboratories and a modeling approach suitable for the discrete and ordered nature of the response variable were selected. The approach enabled the estimation of the distribution of LOS responses, given a set of explanatory variables that describe the geometry and operational effectiveness of the urban street facility. Analysis indicated that participants’ responses tended to be highly variable and that models that characterize the distribution would be preferable to point estimates. A model that uses the number of stops per mile experienced on the facility and the presence of exclusive left-turn lanes at intersections gave the best fit to the data and matched the mean video clip LOS rating 71% of the time. Although direct links between various modes to the automobile users’ perceptions of service quality were not identified, the variable “number of stops” incorporates interruptions experienced by automobile drivers when interacting with buses, bicycles, or pedestrians on urban streets and when encountering traffic signal stops. Although the proposed model was found to improve LOS prediction as compared with the current Highway Capacity Manual method, there are implementation issues that have yet to be addressed.

A driver-distraction-based lane-keeping assistance system

Single-vehicle roadway departure (SVRD) accidents occur in many cases owing to driver distraction or drowsiness constituting a substantial share of today's road vehicle accidents and casualties. This paper describes a distraction-based lane-keeping support system, which intervenes only when the driver is positively detected as being distracted. Distraction here is understood as cognitive and visual distraction, and the focus of this system is on the latter one. In order to estimate the driver's visual distraction level, a video-based driver monitoring system is used. Lane-keeping support is provided by an additional torque applied on the steering shaft in order to regain an appropriate lane position. In this manner the system only intervenes when the vehicle has drifted out of its lane and while the driver is distracted. Test track investigations indicate large opportunities for such a system from a driver perspective, provided that sufficient reliability of the employed vision sensor for lane and face tracking can be obtained.

Body-pillar vision obstructions and lane-change crashes

Introduction This exploratory study investigated the relationship between vision obstructions from body pillars and lane-change crashes. Methods The vision obstructions were quantified by measuring, from the driver's perspective, the horizontal angular sizes and locations of the driver-side A-, B-, and C-pillars. The sample consisted of 21 vehicle models, including 13 passenger cars, 6 SUVs, 1 minivan, and 1 pickup truck. To control for driver differences, going-straight crashes were used for comparison, with the dependent variable being the ratio of lane-change crashes to going-straight crashes. The analysis used North Carolina crash data. Results The results of a multiple regression indicate that the relative frequency of lane-change crashes tended to increase with both wider A-pillars and with A-pillars located farther away from straight ahead. Impact on Industry The finding supports the hypothesis that visibility obstructions due to A-pillars have safety implications.

A new stochastic cellular automaton model on traffic flow and its jamming phase transition

A general stochastic traffic cellular automaton (CA) model, which includes the slow-to-start effect and driver's perspective, is proposed in this paper. It is shown that this model includes well-known traffic CA models such as the Nagel?Schreckenberg model, the quick-start model and the slow-to-start model as specific cases. Fundamental diagrams of this new model clearly show metastable states around the critical density even when the stochastic effect is present. We also obtain analytic expressions of the phase transition curve in phase diagrams by using approximate flow-density relations at boundaries. These phase transition curves are in excellent agreement with numerical results.

STAND-ALONE COLLISION WARNING SYSTEMS BASED ON INFORMATION FROM ON-BOARD SENSORS: Evaluating Performance Relative to System Penetration Rate

This paper looks at stand-alone collision warning systems that are based on information from on-board sensors and evaluates their safety performance relative to system penetration rate. The authors developed an autonomous microscopic traffic simulator for collision warning systems, including both forward vehicle collision warning systems and side collision warning systems, then evaluated such systems through simulation. Safety performance from the perspective of drivers was evaluated using the average distance driven without an accident for both system-equipped and unequipped vehicles. Safety performance from the perspective of road administrators was evaluated using the average interval between accidents. The average distance driven without an accident for system-equipped vehicles, compared to that for a system in which no system-equipped vehicles exist, increases greatly beginning from a low rate of penetration, suggesting that increased rates of penetration are attended by even greater effectiveness. With regard to the average distance driven without an accident for unequipped vehicles, too, increased rates of penetration are attended by increased safety performance due to the collision avoidance effect of warnings produced by system-equipped vehicles. In terms of safety performance from the perspective of road administrators, that is, the average interval between accidents, evaluations indicated that safety performance increases dramatically when the penetration rate exceeds 60%. The above findings illustrate the effect of system penetration rate on the safety performance of stand-alone collision warning systems that are based on information from on-board sensors.

‘A new look at the English landscape’: landscape architecture, movement and the aesthetics of motorways in early postwar Britain

In the past decade or so geographers have been arguing for more performative, practice-oriented and non-representational accounts of the ways in which people encounter, move through and inhabit landscapes, spaces and places. In this paper I argue that these theoretical concerns should also prompt geographers to explore the fairly long history of critical commentaries and aesthetic interventions by writers, artists, film-makers and landscape practitioners who have shown a sensibility to movement and embodied practices in the landscape. The paper then examines how landscape architects focused their attention on the movements, speed and visual perspective of vehicle drivers in their arguments for the landscaping and design of motorways in early postwar Britain. During the 1940s the Institute of Landscape Architects pushed for the involvement of their members in the landscaping and planting of all future roads, and prominent landscape architects criticized the tendency of local authorities and organizations such as the Roads Beautifying Association to plant ornamental trees and shrubs which would interrupt the flow of the landscape and distract drivers travelling at speed. Landscape architects such as Brenda Colvin, Sylvia Crowe and Geoffrey Jellicoe argued for a focus on simplicity, flow and the visual perspective of drivers, and the government's Advisory Committee on the Landscape Treatment of Trunk Roads applied similar criticisms to the work of Sir Owen Williams and Partners in designing and landscaping the earliest sections of Britain's first major motorway, the London to Yorkshire Motorway or M1. The paper examines how landscape architects pushed for a functional modernism to be constructed around the movements and speed of motorists, and it concludes by discussing how an admiration for foreign motorways was tempered by calls for a British motorway modernism reworked in regional and local settings.

Rural Freeway Level of Service Based on Traveler Perception

The concept of level of service (LOS) is meant to reflect the trip quality a traveler will experience on a roadway or other transportation facility. The objective of this study is to provide insight into how road users perceive trip quality on rural freeways and to examine how the existing service measure (density) relates to the perceived trip quality. Study participants were shown a series of video clips of rural freeway travel from a driver's perspective. They then filled out survey forms indicating their opinion of the trip quality provided by the conditions in the video clip. The survey participants were also asked to give background information about themselves and their driving habits. The data from the surveys were analyzed on the basis of an ordered probit model. The first model used as a predictive factor. The second took other roadway and traffic characteristics into account, and the third examined all the significant factors obtained from the survey. The density only model confi...

Rural Freeway Level of Service Based on Traveler Perception

The concept of level of service (LOS) is meant to reflect the trip quality a traveler will experience on a roadway or other transportation facility. The objective of this study is to provide insight into how road users perceive trip quality on rural freeways and to examine how the existing service measure (density) relates to the perceived trip quality. Study participants were shown a series of video clips of rural freeway travel from a driver's perspective. They then filled out survey forms indicating their opinion of the trip quality provided by the conditions in the video clip. The survey participants were also asked to give background information about themselves and their driving habits. The data from the surveys were analyzed on the basis of an ordered probit model. The first model used only density as a predictive factor. The second took other roadway and traffic characteristics into account, and the third examined all the significant factors obtained from the survey. The “density only” model confirmed that density is a strong indicator of travelers’ perceptions of trip quality. The other models showed the significance of other traffic and roadway factors in the perception of trip quality, as well as some socio-economic information and personal driving habits. A set of LOS thresholds was also calculated for the “density only” model on the basis of the survey participants’ responses. The resulting thresholds were considerably lower than the Highway Capacity Manual (HCM) thresholds for all LOS rankings. This suggests that travelers’ tolerance of congestion is lower on rural freeways than the HCM indicates.

Descriptive Analysis of Light Vehicle-Heavy Vehicle Interactions from the Light Vehicle Driver's Perspective

A naturalistic driving study involving 100 light vehicles equipped with video cameras and other data collection equipment was recently completed. The resulting data set was searched to identify critical incidents involving both light vehicles (LVs) and heavy vehicles (HVs). Each incident was coded on a number of dimensions including the type of incident (what happened) and the Critical Reason for the incident (why it happened). Goals of the analysis included gaining a better understanding of LVHV interactions and providing background information that would serve as a necessary prerequisite to the development of crash countermeasures. For 217 of the 246 LV-HV interaction incidents recorded, the event initiator was attributed to either the LV driver (64%) or the HV driver (36%). The most frequent Incident Type for LV driver initiated incidents was Late Braking for Stopped/Stopping Traffic (41.3%), followed by Lane Change Without Sufficient Gap (21.7%). The most frequently noted Critical Reasons for LV driver initiated incidents were Aggressive Driving Behavior (24.6%), Too Fast for Conditions (15.2%), and Internal Distraction (13.8%). Given that LV drivers were more likely to have initiated an incident, it is believed that efforts at addressing the LV-HV interaction problem should include focusing on the LV driver.

Eye fixation scanpaths of younger and older drivers in a hazard perception task

Our previous research has shown that observing patterns of eye fixations is a successful method of establishing differences in underlying cognitive processes between groups of drivers. Eye movements recorded from drivers in a laboratory while they watch film clips recorded from a driver's perspective can be used to identify scanpaths and search patterns that reveal ability differences. In the present study 12 older subjects (60-75 years) and 12 younger subjects (30-45 years) watched clips for potential hazards such as other road users appearing on an intersecting trajectory. Acuity and visual field differences between the two groups were eliminated through screening, so that only age-related differences would emerge. Eye fixations were analysed on a frame-by-frame basis to generate sequences of codes representing the location and object of the viewer's interest, before and during the appearance of a hazard. These codes were analysed for the existence of two fixation scanpaths using Markov Matrices. Unique scanpaths were identified for each group of drivers before and during the hazard. Evidence from the inspection of different objects and from the spread of the search indicated that both groups of driver were sensitive to attentional capture by the appearance of the hazard. Detection of the hazards - both speed and accuracy - was similar for older and younger drivers, although the older drivers perceived the films as being more hazardous in general. There is little evidence in this study of an age-related decline in the search of the scene when detecting hazards.

Complexity theory and landscape ontogenesis: an epistemological approach

Complexity and landscape have been confronted using an epistemological approach. The complexity paradigm has been described using the Uncertainty Hypothesis (UH), the Inter-domain Hypothesis (IH), and the Connection Hypothesis (CH). The landscape ontogenesis theory that describes three main steps in landscape dynamic: novelties, opportunities and events, has been confronted with the complexity hypotheses using a probability perspective (PP), an energy perspective (EP) and a driver perspective (DP). Novelties have been found consistent with UH and PP, Events with IH and EP, and finally Opportunities are connected with CH and DP. This analysis confirms that landscape ontogenesis paradigm can be incorporated in the complexity theory, and that landscape ontogenesis represents a promising approach to investigate the complexity of meso-level systems like the landscape.

Driver Assessment of Service Quality on Urban Streets

This paper presents the results of a study that compared drivers' assessments of the performance of urban streets with objective measures of performance, including level of service (LOS). The purpose of the study was to test the ability of LOS to predict drivers' perceptions of service quality. Seventy-seven automobile drivers rated the service quality of half-mile segments of urban streets as depicted on videotaped scenes from the driver's perspective. Drivers rated 12 to 15 video segments on a sixpoint scale from very satisfactory to very unsatisfactory. After rating all segments, the drivers selected and ranked from a list of 36 factors the three factors that they considered the most important to quality. The results show that the mean driver rating had statistically significant correlations with operational and design characteristics and aesthetics, including the following variables: travel time, average travel speed, number of stops, delay, number of signals, lane width, the presence of trees, and th...

Driver Assessment of Service Quality on Urban Streets

This paper presents the results of a study that compared drivers’ assessments of the performance of urban streets with objective measures of performance, including level of service (LOS). The purpose of the study was to test the ability of LOS to predict drivers’ perceptions of service quality. Seventy-seven automobile drivers rated the service quality of half-mile segments of urban streets as depicted on videotaped scenes from the driver's perspective. Drivers rated 12 to 15 video segments on a six-point scale from very satisfactory to very unsatisfactory. After rating all segments, the drivers selected and ranked from a list of 36 factors the three factors that they considered the most important to quality. The results show that the mean driver rating had statistically significant correlations with operational and design characteristics and aesthetics, including the following variables: travel time, average travel speed, number of stops, delay, number of signals, lane width, the presence of trees, and the quality of the landscaping. LOS, calculated by the Highway Capacity Manual methodology, predicted 35% of the variance in mean driver rating. This finding suggests that LOS does not completely represent drivers’ assessments of performance because drivers perceive the quality of urban street segments in several dimensions, including travel efficiency, sense of safety, and aesthetics.