ERTICO: Toward a "fully integrated and sustainable transport system"

Andrew

Andrew Tolve

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24th October 2011

Briefly, what does your department/company do?

ERTICO is the network of Intelligent Transport Systems and Services stakeholders in Europe. We connect and support cooperation among public authorities, research institutes, service providers, telecommunication operators, automotive suppliers, industries manufacturers, users, and national ITS associations.

Together with our ERTICO Partners, we work on a portfolio of activities to accelerate the development and deployment of ITS across Europe and beyond. Our work is to create a strong networking platform for international collaborative research via projects development and management, news and information exchange, organisation of forum, workshops and annual congresses.

What was the most challenging part of 2010/2011 for your company and how did you overcome it?

One of our biggest challenges for the past years and for the future is to develop and implement a fully integrated and sustainable transport system. ERTICO currently focuses on ITS and road transport as our partners express a great interest in these issues.

As a next step, ERTICO aims to strengthen its project portfolio and create a deployment platform on public transport issues.

What challenges do you think the telematics industry still faces?

With reference to ERTICO activities, ITS technologies are already at very advanced levels, and many ITS services that support traffic management and provide driver navigation and traveller information already exist.

Nevertheless, there is a vast space within the industry for future developments of communication and positioning technologies that will allow the provision of additional applications on traffic and traveller information, awareness and driving assistance, hazard warning and accident avoidance.

An additional main challenge is to provide co-modal cooperative mobility services, based on interaction amongst road users, travellers, network operators and service providers as enabled by X2X connectivity.

With so much competition among automakers, can technical openness succeed? How do you see the industry addressing the challenges of open innovation?

Open innovation is a challenge for the automotive industry because it requires a review of the way industries think and make business.

Indeed, open innovation is based not only on cooperation and exchange of information but also on the idea that the creation of new technologies can develop general wealth and produce mutual benefits.

The industry is slowly changing and starting to be less suspicious and more open to new forms of cooperation.

What key topics or issues are you are looking to discuss with the industry at the show and why are they important for moving the industry forward?

Traffic efficiency is one of our main concerns. The increase in cars and private transports in European cities is the primary cause of congestion of roads and energy consumption and has negative consequences on environment and social life.

ITS play an important part in making transport greener, reducing energy consumption, implementing traffic control and management systems, and supporting drivers to have a fuel-efficient driving behaviour.

Safety is another key issue for European mobility, and more research is needed to unlock the potential of intelligent and advanced drivers’ assistance systems. These systems can detect accidents, inform drivers well in advance before they get close to the accident’s area, and keep vehicles at a safe distance.

eCall is also an important service to improve safety in a new urban mobility design; it will not reduce the number of accidents but will improve response times in case of hazard and provide faster help.

ERTICO has developed recommendations for deployment and supports eCall activities through pilots, the eCall implementation platform and contributions to standardisation.

What developments/trends do you see impacting the industry over the next two to five years?

Developments in telecommunications, internet, vehicle production, infrastructures, public transport and political decisions will all influence the market in different ways.

Among future trends, next generation mobile communications with technologies providing the opportunity to exchange more data with lower latency and a future Internet that will allow all ITS users to be linked, will probably have the biggest impact on the industry.