ANN ARBOR—A crash avoidance program at the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute (UMTRI) has won the Intelligent Transportation Society of America’s 2008 Best of ITS Award for Best Innovative Product or Service.

The award, presented to Visteon Corp. last month at the ITS World Congress in New York, recognizes projects that have demonstrated specific and measurable outcomes and exemplified innovation by establishing a “new dimension” of performance.

The award honors crash warning technology for light vehicles developed by Visteon as part of the Integrated Vehicle-Based Safety Systems (IVBSS) program, which is led by UMTRI.

“We appreciate ITS America’s recognition of the program’s efforts, and particularly the development of IVBSS for the light vehicle platform by Visteon,” said Jim Sayer, IVBSS program director and UMTRI researcher.

The technology fully integrates a suite of crash warning features, including forward collision and road departure warnings, lane-change merge alerts and blind spot detection. The system provides drivers with situational awareness of the vehicle’s surroundings and warns drivers when they are about to leave the roadway, are in danger of colliding with another vehicle while attempting a lane change, or are at risk of colliding with the vehicle ahead.

“While these features cannot substitute for safe driving, they can potentially increase the driver’s awareness of road conditions and improve response time to potential hazards,” said Debby Bezzina, Visteon electronics program manager. “This is very important as driver distraction and congestion are increasing.”

The system uses information gathered by inertial, video and radar sensors, plus a global positioning system, to warn drivers of potentially dangerous situations to prevent or lessen the impact of crashes. The winning technology was developed for use in passenger cars, though the IVBSS program also incorporates similar technologies for heavy trucks. Both light vehicle and heavy truck systems are currently being tested on the road by lay drivers and commercial truck drivers, respectively.

ITS America is the leading advocate for technologies that improve the safety, security and efficiency of the nation’s surface transportation system. Its 2008 annual meeting is the largest event in the world for ITS leaders, policymakers and other industry professionals. The ITS Award honors the most innovative, effective and influential achievements in the intelligent transportation systems industry.

In addition to UMTRI and Visteon, IVBSS program partners include Eaton Corp., Honda R&D Americas Inc., Cognex Corp., International Truck and Engine Corp., Con-way Freight, Battelle and the Michigan Department of Transportation. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration are conducting the IVBSS initiative, funded as part of the U.S. DOT’s Research and Innovative Technology Administration’s Intelligent Transportation Systems Technology program.

UMTRI