Hyundai Unveils AV Warning Lighting Systems
Hyundai’s component-making unit is launching lighting systems it says can warn other road users when a vehicle is being driven autonomously.
The systems are being unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES). One of them is the Indicating Lighting Zone, which Hyundai Mobis says indicates to pedestrians and other motorists when a car is being self-driven.
The other is the Communication Lighting Zone, which the company says enables “safer” coexistence between autonomous vehicles and neighboring cars and pedestrians through the use of “LED, digital boards, headlamp projection, and sound to communicate with … [them] during various driving scenarios”.
It claims this means AVs can see pedestrians from over 450 feet away and when they detect them, they are able to project a red beam of light to them warning them it will shortly be unsafe to cross the street. When the car halts, a ‘walking’ sign is then projected onto the ground informing pedestrians it is then safe to cross. When the AV is shortly to begin driving again, Hyundai Mobis claims the LED boards issue a countdown to when it does and flash arrows to show road users outside the vehicle its direction of travel.
Hyundai Mobis says it developed the tech in response to the killing of cyclist Elaine Herzberg by an Uber AV in Tempe, Arizona last March. Mirco Goetz, the company’s director of lamp engineering, claims it will help automakers “continue the advancement of AV technology, while helping to keep pedestrians and drivers out of harm’s way”.
