Author: Virginia Petraki
An NTUA Diploma Thesis titled “Event identification based on driving characteristics on rural roads” was recently presented by Akrivi Varela. Focus was put on determining the main factors that can describe the situation before and during an event. Results showed that random forest model performs much better than the binomial logistic regression model in identifying event occurrence with very few false alarms. Moreover, speed and longitudinal acceleration along with total distance driven from the beginning of the driving session, turned out to better describe the case of driving one minute prior to an event. Finally, driving during an event can be sufficiently described through speed, the deviation of the vehicle from the middle of the road as well as time headway with the vehicle ahead. 
The PRAXI Network and the General Secretariat of Research and Technology organised the “Climate-neutral & Smart Cities” webinar within the framework of Horizon Europe, on July 7, 2020. The webinar presented the mission and enrolled in a discussion between stakeholders from academia, research and public authorities. 
NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation: Sustainable Mobility in Smart Cities
NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation: Sustainable Mobility in Smart Cities
The University of Thessaly, Department of Civil Engineering, Traffic, Transportation and Logistics Laboratory (TTLog), organised on-line the 5th Conference on Sustainable Urban Mobility (VirtualCSUM2020) on June 17-19, 2020. The theme of this year’s conference was “Advances in Mobility as a Service Systems” and its objective was the dissemination of knowledge and the exchange of good practices among researchers and practitioners in the domain of urban transportation. NTUA contributed actively with several traffic safety papers and presentations:
NTUA contributed actively with several traffic safety papers and presentations:
- A taxonomy of skills and knowledge for efficient autonomous vehicle operation
- Investigating the correlation of mobile phone use with trip characteristics recorded through smartphone sensors
- Benchmarking Analysis of Road Safety Levels for an Extensive and Representative Dataset of European Cities
- A comparative gap analysis for electromobility and alternative fuels
The European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) has published a PIN Briefing “The Impact of Covid-19 Lockdowns on Road Deaths in April 2020“, with the active contribution of NTUA. This Report assesses Covid-19 measures impact on road deaths in Europe during the month of April 2020 – by which time most countries were in lockdown. Out of 25 EU countries for which data is available, 19 saw a decrease in the number of road deaths in April 2020 compared to the month of April in the previous three years (910 people in 2020 compared to 1.415 people on 2019). A conclusion is that there were very substantial reductions in the number of road deaths as a result of the big drops in traffic volumes due to confinement.
The EU’s High Level Group for Road Safety held a discussion on road safety in the COVID era on 16 June and agreed on some conclusions setting out common principles for the forthcoming transitional period. It is highlighted the importance of obtaining and sharing timely data and the enhancement of safe active mobility. Ιt has also emphasized the need to reinstate road safety enforcement, particularly if higher volumes of cars return to the roads and to restore public confidence in public transport.
According to the European Commission, compared to previous years, fewer people lost their lives on EU roads in 2019. An estimated 22.800 people died in a road crash last year (2% less than in 2018), almost 7.000 fewer fatalities than in 2010 – a decrease of 23%. Eight Member States registered their lowest fatality numbers on record in 2019: Croatia, Finland France, Germany, Greece, Latvia, Luxembourg and Sweden. However, progress has slowed in several other countries.
In the framework of the SLAIN project (Saving Lives Assessing and Improving TEN-T Road Network Safety) which is implemented in Greece by the Road Safety Institute (RSI) ‘Panos Mylonas’ in cooperation with the International Organization EuroRAP, a risk map of the Greek road network was created. The risk is presented by different colors (black-red-orange-yellow-green, from the highest to the lowest level of risk).
In the framework of the Executive MSc in Cities Laboratory (EMC Lab) of London School of Economics (LSE), a programme for urban professionals in the public, private and third sectors who want to understand and deliver change in cities, NTUA contributed actively with a presentation titled “Strategic Transport Planning in Athens“. It was highlighted the current mobility situation in Athens, the effect of COVID-19 in traffic and road safety and new mobility interventions.
The EU-funded Horizon 2020 project Levitate (Societal Level Impacts of Connected and Automated Vehicles) organised with great success the 2nd Webinar on the impacts of automation in urban transport – featuring local urban strategies on 11 June, 2020. This webinar provided an insight into the challenges that urban mobility is facing due to the COVID-19 crisis and into mid-term local mobility strategies. There were presentations from LEVITATE partners: NTUA, Transport for Greater Manchester, and Free Hanseatic City of Bremen. The full recording of the webinar is available: NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation: Urban Transport Services
The full recording of the webinar is available: NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation: Urban Transport Services
The Laboratory for Road Engineering and Sealing Components of the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology (Empa) organised the 9th International Conference on Maintenance and Rehabilitation of Pavements (MAIREPAV9) which took place with great success on 1 – 3 July 2020, in Zurich. The MAIREPAV series aims to promote and discuss the state-of-the-art design, maintenance, rehabilitation and management of pavements. MAIREPAV9 focused on sustainable design, testing and evaluation, and management of pavement infrastructures. The conference aimed to present and discuss current knowledge of the ever-changing challenges to researchers, engineers, managers and professionals from all over the world who are involved in design and management of pavements. NTUA actively contributed with the following paper:
NTUA actively contributed with the following paper:
Within the framework of 15th International Conference Road Safety in Local Communities, UNECE together with the Serbian Road Traffic Safety Agency organised with great success an online Workshop on 25 June 2020. The aim of the Workshop was to strengthen knowledge of representatives of the South‐East Europe member States on road safety management, evidence‐based decision making on road safety strategic goals and targets and the role of the Global Framework Plan of Action of Road Safety in development of road safety system. NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation: EU Strategic Action Plan on Road Safety
NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation: EU Strategic Action Plan on Road Safety
European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) published the 14th edition of PIN Annual Report , presented at the 2020 ETSC Road Safety Performance Index Award event which took place on-line with great success on 17 June 2020. Estonia, Greece, Lithuania, Latvia and Portugal have reduced road deaths the most since 2010 while road deaths in Malta, the Netherlands and the UK were higher in 2019 than in 2010. Road safety progress is demonstrated but away from the decade targets. Estonia was awarded with the 2020 European Transport Safety Council Road Safety Performance Index Award. 
, presented at the 2020 ETSC Road Safety Performance Index Award event which took place on-line with great success on 17 June 2020. Estonia, Greece, Lithuania, Latvia and Portugal have reduced road deaths the most since 2010 while road deaths in Malta, the Netherlands and the UK were higher in 2019 than in 2010. Road safety progress is demonstrated but away from the decade targets. Estonia was awarded with the 2020 European Transport Safety Council Road Safety Performance Index Award. 
The 6th Congress of the European Academy of Neurology took place virtually with great success, on 23 – 26 May, 2020. The theme of the congress was “Time for Action: Predict, Prevent, Repair”. The sessions focused on showing the novel therapeutic interventions, designed to predict, protect and repair neurodegenerative diseases. Some sessions concerned cognitive impairment and road safety. NTUA contributed actively with the following presentations:
NTUA contributed actively with the following presentations:
The Hellenic Association of Driving Instructors together with Key Transportation Organisations in Greece organized an International Multidisciplinary Traffic Safety on-line Conference on 29-30 May 2020. The Conference aims concerned the evaluation of traffic and road safety in Greece, the identification of current and future pedestrians and vehicles traffic problems in Greece related to new technologies, the exchange of experiences from scientific studies, and current traffic safety actions and practices in Greece and internationally. NTUA actively contributed with the following presentations:
NTUA actively contributed with the following presentations:
- Road users perception of driving fatigue
- The consequences of autonomous buses in traffic, safety and the environment for future mobility scenarios
- Evaluation and improvement of driver behavior and safety through mobile phone application
- International Experience in Environmental Pricing in Transportation
- The COVID-19 crisis as an opportunity for new mobility models: Athens Great Walk
The World Road Association – PIARC recently published a Report titled “Implementation of National Safe System Policies: A Challenge”, providing a summary of National Safe System Policies and Implementation in relation to the Safe System Approach. The Report also highlights the steps that low, middle and high-income countries alike can take to accelerate progress towards Safe System outcomes. Emphasis is given to road infrastructure safety and the respective institutional safety management.
The European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) has published the 39th PIN Flash Report “How to improve the safety of goods vehicles in the EU?“. This report examines the toll transport of goods and services has taken in terms of road deaths over the period 2010 to 2018. It examines the performance of individual countries, as well as the European Union as a whole, in tackling the risks, and describes some of the policies needed to reduce future deaths and serious injuries related to goods traffic.
A new NACTO resource on emerging street practices for pandemic response and recovery was developed through a collaboration between the National Association of City Transportation Officials (NACTO), the NACTO Global Designing Cities Initiative, Bloomberg Associates, Street Plans, and Sam Schwartz. This resource aggregates and synthesizes emerging practices in transportation and street design in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. It highlights cities’ current efforts to re-organize streets to best manage this crisis and support economic recovery. This new resource will be revised and expanded regularly as more data becomes available on what approaches are the most successful at meeting city goals.
The May 2020 newsletter of the EU funded Horizon 2020 project Levitate (Societal Level Impacts of Connected and Automated Vehicles) was recently released highlighting the relation of automated vehicles and COVID-19. It presents an interview with Helmut Augustin, City of Vienna, and the first LEVITATE webinar on the impacts of automation in freight transport.
The 2nd Newsletter of the Horizon 2020 project BeOpen (European forum and observatory for open science in transport) was recently released highlighting the results of the second project meeting (Piraeus, February 2020), the EOSC Symposium results and the EC President’s speech mentioning the importance of the European Open Science Cloud. Sign up here:
Sign up here: 
The 6th International Conference on Vehicle Technology and Intelligent Transport Systems (VEHITS) was held on 2-4 May 2020. The purpose of VEHITS 2020 is to bring together engineers, researchers and practitioners interested in the advances and applications in the field of Vehicle Technology and Intelligent Transport Systems. This conference covered areas such as Connected Vehicles, Data Analytics, Intelligent Transport Systems and Infrastructure, Intelligent Vehicle Technologies, Smart Mobility and Sustainable Transport Services.
The European Commission has recently published the “Study on the feasibility, costs and benefits of retrofitting advanced driver assistance to improve road safety“, prepared by VTT and Ecorys. This study examined the technical feasibility of various retrofit ADAS systems (voluntarily or mandatory installable) while demonstrated the potential safety impacts of retrofitting the vehicle fleet and presented a cost-benefit assessment for the measures. Detection and warning of pedestrians and cyclists nearby the front or side of the vehicle proved having the highest benefit-cost ratio, as addressing the Vulnerable Road Users safety, being the key current road safety problem.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) published recently the “European Regional Status Report on Road Safety 2019” with the active contribution of NTUA. The European Regional Status Report on Road Safety describes the progress made by Governments in the Region. This Report demonstrates that over 221 people are killed on roads every day in the WHO European Region while thousands more are injured or disabled, with long-lasting effects. People from the eastern part of our Region bear the highest burden of road-traffic mortality and morbidity.
Audrey Testaferrata de Noto has successfully defended his PhD dissertation titled: Driver Perception-Reaction Times in Level 3 Automated Vehicles. This PhD thesis was carried out at the Faculty for the Build Environment of the University of Malta under the supervision of NTUA Prof. George Yannis. The scope of the research was to establish the Perception-Reaction Time (PRT) of drivers in a simulated Level 3 vehicle and to examine the interdependency between the person-specific characteristics in relation to different scenarios featuring different in-vehicle distractions and different type of alerts and subsequently to compare these values with those of standard specifications used in road design in different countries for the calculation of Stopping Sight Distances (SSD). The results gave an average perception-reaction time of 4.23 seconds and showed that the younger age groups have lower PRTs for all scenarios than their older counterparts.
The Traffic Safety Agency of Republic of Srpska in cooperation with the European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) organized with great success the 9th International Conference Road Safety in Local Community, in Banja Luka, Republic of Srpska on 29-30 October 2020. The Conference was aiming to strengthen and develop capacities at the local level and create synergies for significant road safety improvements in the country.
NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation: Road Safety Strategy in Greece
NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation: Road Safety Strategy in Greece
A paper titled “An exploration of European road users’ safety attitudes towards speeding” authored by Alexandra Laiou, Athanasios Theofilatos, George Yannis, Uta Meesmann and Katrien Torfs is now published in Journal of Transportation Safety & Security. The objective of this paper is to analyse attitudes and opinions of Europeans on speeding and compare them amongst countries based on demographic characteristics as well as to provide a number of recommendations to be used in the effort to reduce speeding and improve road safety. All reported attitudes depend strongly on participants’ gender and age. The majority of people who accept driving over the speed limit do not believe that speed limits are set at acceptable levels. 
The 1st newsletter of the Horizon 2020 project Drive2theFuture (Needs, wants and behaviour of drivers and automated vehicle users today and into the future) was recently released highlighting the 1st Drive2theFuture Workshop (Brussels, March 2020), together with the Autonomous Vehicles consumer survey and the results from the three Plenary Meetings which took place so far. The 1st Newsletter highlights also the 12 pilots of the project and makes a reference to the three Horizon 2020 projects which focus also on driver behaviour and acceptance of connected, cooperative and automated transport. Sign up here.
Sign up here.
In France since July 1, 2018, the speed limit on all two-way roads, without a central separator, outside urban areas was reduced from 90 km/h to 80 km/h. The French Road Safety Observatory (ONISR) and Cerema published recently a provisional 18-months evaluation in which it was demonstrated that over the year 2019, compared to the reference average for 2013-2017, 211 lives were saved on the network outside built-up areas outside motorways, while at the same time 44 more lives were lost in built-up areas.
Global Road Safety Partnership (GRSP) in collaboration with the VIAS Institute recently published the Manual on “Towards the 12 voluntary global targets for road safety”, providing guidance for countries on activities and measures to achieve the voluntary global road safety performance targets. It spells out what type of activities need to be undertaken, what data sources can be used and how performance can be measured and presented. It defines each target and points out what actions need to be taken and how each target can be measured.
The Horizon 2020 project Levitate (Societal Level Impacts of Connected and Automated Vehicles) organised a webinar on the future impacts of automation in freight transport on 23 April 2020, 10:00-11:30 CET. This webinar gave an insight on autonomous solutions in freight, as well as their future impacts and potentials in the transport sector. It was presented an introduction of LEVITATE and its use case on freight transport, the project ALEES from VIL (Platform for the logistics sector in Flanders) and an overview of ALICE on Autonomous Freight Transport Potentials.
International Road Federation (IRF) – Geneva in collaboration with the European Union Road Federation (ERF) and the European Association of Tollway Operators (ASECAP) organised the IRF Virtual Workshop on “Unleashing road infrastructure potential for Cooperative, Connected and Automated Mobility (CCAM)”, on 23 April 2020. This workshop session provided insights into the role, the vision and challenges of the road infrastructure sector in this transition period towards Cooperative, Connected and Automated Mobility (CCAM). With an average audience of 200 international participants, 12 speakers from different backgrounds described how road infrastructure stakeholders will contribute to the new mobility ecosystem stressing the importance of mutual understanding and collaboration with other sectors.
