European Commission sets sights on connected cars to warn drivers within three years

The European Commission has declared that connected cars should be on the road by 2019 as industry representatives and public authorities agreed a shared vision for deploying co-operative intelligent transport systems.

Vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure communications have a "strong potential to improve road safety and road transport efficiency," the report states, but says without common action, deciding where to start investing, and how to make systems inter-operable, would be problematic. The report is the work of the C-ITS Platform, bringing together stakeholders in the field, has agreed a common technical framework, with services such as hazardous location notifications, slow or stationary vehicles and traffic or road works ahead warnings, and weather conditions reports.

Further services, for which specifications or standards "might not be completely ready," include vulnerable road user protection, on-street parking management, connected navigation for route advice. The report concludes that it is urgent that a common framework is agreed, given the industry is already deploying C-ITS equipped vehicles in other parts of the world". The group asks the Commission to take a lead.