Commission launches C-ITS public consultation
On Friday June 24, the European Commission’s Directorate-General on Mobility and Transport (DG MOVE) has opened a public consultation on the European Union C-ITS initiative.
This public consultation aims at collecting the opinions of stakeholders and interested parties, including EU citizens and private and public organisations, with regard to possible actions at EU level to support the accelerated and interoperable deployment of Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems (C-ITS) in the EU.
The replies submitted to this public consultation will be analysed and taken into consideration during the development of the C-ITS Master Plan, a Communication by the European Commission that is foreseen for the second half of 2016, and the first non-legislative step of a roadmap for the deployment of C-ITS across Europe. Please visit the web page of this public consultation for more information and background documents.
Background
The cooperative nature of new advanced intelligent transport systems lies in the collecting and processing of data from different sources (vehicles, infrastructure, sensors …) and sending this to all transport users (drivers, passengers, cyclists, pedestrians, road authorities, freight planners …) so they can take well-informed decisions, anticipating and avoiding congestion and accidents.
C-ITS can cover a very wide range of different services, such as improving road safety by avoiding accidents and reducing their severity, for example by warning for emergency breaking manoeuvres of cars just ahead or when rapidly approaching slowing traffic. Decreasing congestion by optimising performance and available capacity of existing road transport infrastructure is another subset of services, for example by shockwave damping (using dynamic speed limits to avoid small disturbances to amplify and create “ghost traffic jams”, appearing seemingly out of nowhere) or optimal speed advice in urban environments (GLOSA) to reduce stop times and unnecessary acceleration and deceleration. All of these services will benefit travel time reliability, reduce energy use and negative environmental impact and create secondary effects such as reduced driver fatigue and reduced mechanical wear. For professional drivers and fleet owners this creates new possibilities for enhanced vehicle fleet management.
In recognition of the high potential that C-ITS offer, several policy documents have reiterated the need and support for enhanced deployment of these systems:
The 2008 Communication from the Commission “Action Plan for the Deployment of Intelligent Transport Systems in Europe” includes several actions addressing the wider deployment of C-ITS in Europe.
Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems are a priority under Article 2 (iv) and Annex I (Priority Area IV) of Directive 2010/40/EU on the framework for the deployment of Intelligent Transport Systems in the field of road transport and for interfaces with other modes of transport.
The importance of the policy was reiterated in the 2011 White Paper “Roadmap to a Single European Transport Area – Towards a competitive and resource efficient transport system”. Following experience gathered through EU and nationally funded Research and Innovation over the past years, C-ITS are now mature and the best time for co-ordinating their deployment to ensure interoperability is considered to be before separate/proprietary systems and ecosystems have fully developed. Mass deployment has not yet started in the EU and Europe risks lagging behind compared to other parts of the world. Therefore, the European Commission engaged in a dialogue with Member States and private stakeholders in a dedicated forum to address these open issues.
The Platform for the Deployment of C-ITS in the European Union (C-ITS Platform), a Commission Expert Group launched in July 2014, met for the first time in November 2014. The platform provides an operational instrument for dialogue, exchange of technical knowledge and cooperation, with the aim to build a shared vision on issues hampering coordinated deployment of C-ITS across the EU. The C-ITS Platform consists of more than 100 stakeholders that meet on a monthly basis in 11 different Working Groups. The first phase of the C-ITS platform resulted in a final expert report pdf – 3 MB [3 MB] which was endorsed consensually on 21 January 2016. This is particularly important as successful deployment of C-ITS, maximising its benefits, will depend heavily on interoperability of systems and vehicles, i.e. across brands, across borders and with seamless transitions from national to regional and local authorities.
During the plenary meeting on 25 April 2016 the C-ITS Platform – supported by the Amsterdam Declaration on connected and automated driving – entered its second phase. The C-ITS platform will continue to support the interoperable deployment of C-ITS in the EU, monitor the implementation of the recommendations of Phase I and expand its scope by including two new focus areas 1) the urban environment 2) the links with automation. The latter, to ensure complementarity with other Commission initiatives on automation , will focus on road infrastructure, road safety and enhanced traffic management, from the combined perspective of connected and automated driving.
Funding for C-ITS pilot projects has been available under EU funding programmes (TEN-T, CEF, FP7 and H2020). Some Member States are about to start deployment in real life conditions on selected motorway corridors in Europe. Interoperability will need to be supported by the successfully linking of such projects and cross testing of vehicles and infrastructure. Finally, EFSI might also provide additional financing opportunities for the deployment of Cooperative Intelligent Transport Services.
The consultation will last until September 16 2016.
Interested parties can participate by responding to the questionnaire .
For more information, please click here.
Source: European Commission
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In: CLEPA News, Connectivity & Automation, Growth & Competitiveness, Safety