Historically, there have been two parallel transportation safety efforts: vehicle manufacturers have tried to reduce injury severity by increasing occupant protection and improving crashworthiness, and public officials have tried to mitigate and prevent crashes by changing individual human behavior. While significant improvements have been made, these improvements have not been equitable across all populations. At Arrival, we take a more holistic approach and think about the transportation system as a whole, and how we ensure that everyone benefits from safer (and cleaner) transportation.
Defining the problem
According to the World Health Organization, approximately 1.35 million people die each year in traffic crashes — that’s 31 people by the time you have read this Medium post. In addition, there are another estimated 20–50 million people injured in crashes. This burden is disproportionately felt in low- and middle-income countries where 93% of these deaths occur despite only having about 60% of the world’s vehicles. Closer to home in the United States, there was a 23% increase in Black American fatalities between 2019 and 2020, despite there being 430.2 billion fewer miles travelled on US roads due to COVID-19 lockdowns.
Equally worrying is that over the last decade, pedestrian and cyclist fatalities have increased by 51%. These fatalities are racially inequitable — Black Americans were struck and killed by drivers at an 82% higher rate than White Americans.
Various studies have estimated that the societal cost and decreased quality of life due to these fatalities is around $800 billion dollars in the United States alone, or up to 2.7% of a low- or middle-income country’s gross domestic product.
As the former National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Chairman, Robert Sumwalt stated in a recent interview;
“There ought to be social outrage that we lose so many people and have so many serious injuries on our nation’s roadways each year. The numbers are going the wrong way.”
During my twenty-two year long career, I have had the opportunity to work on some of the most advanced and forward thinking safety technologies and testing programs, and have seen improvements in vehicle safety and their impact on people’s lives. But these have been incremental improvements which haven’t been able to significantly reduce fatalities and injuries, and the benefits of new technologies are oftentimes not equitably distributed (especially for women, elderly, disabled, or lower income people).
I am a firm advocate for vehicle automation and the significant impact it will have on reducing traffic fatalities and injuries, and we should continue to increase investment, innovate and test this technology. But it isn’t sufficient to wait and hope that this technology comes to market before tens of millions of people lose their lives; there is so much we can be doing in the shorter term that will have a significant impact.
Safety at Arrival
I’m very happy to announce that Richard Schram joined my team recently to lead these safety efforts around the world. Richard joins us from Euro NCAP where he has served as Technical Director.
First and foremost, we need to dramatically decrease total vehicle-miles-travelled (VMT) annually, since it is correlated to the number of injuries and fatalities that are caused by distraction, human error, drunk driving, etc (Although the pandemic and national lockdown reduced VMT, the fatality rate increased). This is where Arrival will have a radical impact and why I decided to join the company 2 years ago.
At the core of Arrival’s strategy is the focus on accelerating the adoption of zero emission commercial vehicles by making them more affordable and manufacturing locally, and creating those vehicle segments that will have the largest reductions on VMT;
The Arrival Bus: Increasing ridership on mass transit;
The Arrival Van: Reducing the amount of trips to the store by fulfilling the potential of eCommerce;
The Arrival Car: Developing an affordable, purpose-built electric vehicle to increase access to shared mobility solutions.
We are developing a layered safety strategy to ensure we make the greatest impact to people’s lives and we’ll talk more about the specifics in future posts.
The first layer covers Prevention, Protection & Survivability, which should not look out of place for any manufacturer. We have a data driven safety analysis to reduce and mitigate the occurrence and severity of hazards and risks. In those unavoidable scenarios where a crash occurs, we focus on protecting occupants, vulnerable road users, first responders, and other road actors through a range of active and passive safety systems. Equally important is ensuring that people receive the medical attention they need as soon as possible, which is linked to their survival rate.
Arrival is a Technology company, so this forms the second layer. We will continue to develop innovative, safety-focused technologies, increase assistance and automation, and conduct research into those areas, which will make significant improvements in safety. For example, we will leverage a fully connected vehicle manufacturing and operation environment including robust traceability, telematics, and over-the-air updates, to identify and fix issues before they become problems.
Accessibility & Inclusivity
Accessibility and inclusivity are at Arrival’s core and we believe that everyone should benefit from safer transportation. Firstly, we are thinking through how we design vehicles so that our technology and vehicle designs aren’t biased towards a narrow population — research has shown that we need to broaden our view and address many other populations including women, atypical body types, persons with disabilities, and the elderly (among others).
Second, our commitment to radical impact is driving our efforts to design and launch vehicles around the world in all socioeconomic communities, so it is not just developed nations that benefit. As we look to global markets and cities, safety is one of our priorities to understand how we can achieve that ‘radical impact’ and make the roads safer for everyone.
Vision Zero
Vision Zero was developed in Sweden in the late 1990’s with the goal that no one should be injured or killed as the result of a traffic related crash. At its heart is the idea that the responsibility for road safety should shift from road users to those who designed the transport system. This includes urban planners, vehicle manufacturers, transit operators and legislators, to name a few. This has since become an international approach thanks to the Vision Zero Academy, Vision Zero Network, and Road to Zero initiatives.
But there is still a long way to go. As we engage with cities around the world, we are committing to promoting the principles and tools of Vision Zero, and helping build up local programs which address the most serious issues. In addition, we are exploring how we can provide cities with the data and resources needed to implement targeted improvements in infrastructure, and to educate & empower their communities on safety initiatives.
Finally, this ambitious plan will only be possible if Arrival has safety ingrained in our culture, with leadership support, a robust framework for continuous improvement, and is actively promoting and facilitating the safety discussion around the world. To that end we are working on a Safety Management System that will do just that. An essential part of this is our Safety Management & Review Board that will monitor the implementation of the SMS and review any safety concern we identify.
Richard Colley is Arrival’s Public Policy & Product Safety Lead. For more information on Arrival visit our website.
