Making roads safer with data

This problem is particularly important in cities, where traffic congestion is increasing due to rapid urbanization: more than 80% of the world's population is expected to live in cities by 2050.

City roads are overloaded and deteriorating faster than they can be repaired. And when you combine increasingly busy roads with damaged road infrastructure (potholes, cracks etc.), safety is compromised.

This is a big problem, but one that can be solved. Data can – and in fact already does – solve many road safety problems.

Harnessing the true potential of connected vehicle data

City councils and local authorities are under intense pressure to make our roads safer, but they cannot initiate repairs if they do not know what is damaged.

Without transparency into what is really happening on the roads around the clock, any effort to improve them relies on getting real-time data – and little progress is being made in tackling the road safety problem.

But we are now at a time when this should no longer be the case. Having been on the roadmap of the mobility sector for a very long time, connected vehicles are on our roads and help us to better understand them.

Currently, we use these vehicles and their sensors to collect anonymized and aggregated data in real time, capturing a lot of information: braking events, road conditions, traffic volume, vehicle speed, etc. We end up with a huge volume of data, and that's where AI comes in - processing that mountain of raw information and helping us turn it into actionable insights.

And what can we do with our results? We can highlight which intersections generate the most claims, which areas generate the most frequent traffic jams, and even enable predictive road maintenance to save time, money and above all lives. .

Using data, we can shed light on the reality of our roads so that local communities and road authorities can better visualize them, helping them to take road safety action based on reliable data, gathered from information collected in real time.

Data is the new oil, the engine that powers positive developments on our roads and the future of smart city planning.

Building the modern city of tomorrow

To find out how a city can rebuild its road infrastructure in a safe way, look no further than the Dutch city of Alkmaar.

With a third of the city being rebuilt, Alkmaar is becoming the archetype for the development and implementation of new urban planning technologies – a project that Bridgestone Mobility Solutions is proud to be part of.

If the visibility of traffic problems is one of the main reasons for their persistence, Alkmaar proves that with real-time sensors and data collection, we can not only see what is happening on the city's roads in real time, but also predict what will happen. Where urban planning used to be about looking at maps and traffic volumes, in Alkmaar it's about understanding situational factors for all road users.

Bridgestone Mobility Solutions' contribution to these efforts is to use data from every vehicle in the city to capture and observe braking in real time - determining where, when and why road users are braking. We are able to observe this data in real time, allowing decision makers to immediately understand where security risks lie.

The power of collaboration for data insights

Alkmaar isn't just a showcase of how data can be used to rebuild a city - it's also a great example of why safer roads require collaboration between the private and public sectors.

At Bridgestone Mobility Solutions, we work with several leading partners, including Microsoft and Analyze (by KBenP), alongside the city of Alkmaar to improve road safety and modernize the city for the future.

Data is essential, but Alkmaar shows that a step-by-step approach to data sharing will unlock the greatest value for future cities and society.

Tribune by Raghunath Banerjee, Vice President of Data Solutions and Innovation, Bridgestone Mobility Solutions (LinkedIn).