All eyes in the Australian motor insurance industry have turned this week to Ipswich, Queensland, where the country’s largest ever connected vehicle trial has officially hit the road. Should the trial – called the Ipswich Connected Vehicle Pilot (ICVP) - be a success, it could dramatically impact the way motor insurance claims are made and adjusted in the future.
The ICVP, which was delivered with the support of the Motor Accident Insurance Commission, among others, includes 500 vehicles fitted with Cohda’s MK5H On-board units, according to a report in Traffic Technology International (TTI). This technology enables the vehicles to ‘talk’ to each other and to roadside infrastructure and road operation systems.
The vehicles then provide drivers with safety warnings related to their local driving environment, which, in theory, should improve road safety and thus reduce the frequency and possibly even the severity of motor insurance claims. Furthermore, if insurers gain access to connected vehicle data, they will get a better view of road events and will be able to adjust claims with greater accuracy and efficiency.
“Cohda’s V2X technology will work in symphony with independent roadside infrastructure technology as well as the human-machine interfaces that have been fitted to vehicles to supply warnings to drivers,” Cohda Wireless CEO Dr. Paul Gray told TTI. “In summary, ICVP is a model C-ITS deployment delivering on safety applications which encompasses Vehicle-2-Vehicle and Vehicle-2-Infrastructure interoperability. The trial is very comprehensive from a technical perspective, reflecting the most contemporary approach possible, including cellular, HMI, cyber security, RTK location enhancement with data management in the cloud.”
The ICVP has gained lots of public support from south east Queenslanders. The region’s transport and main roads minister Mark Bailey, commented: “In Queensland, between January 01 and September 15, 2020, there were 183 fatalities as a result of crashes, which is 30 greater than for the same period in 2019 and 15 greater than the previous five-year average. Pilot programmes like the ICVP are crucial to explore the safety benefits of emerging vehicle technologies and work to help reduce lives lost on our roads.”
