Vechile to Vechile Communication

The U.S. Department of Transportation on Monday announced it would move forward with a plan that would make car-to-car communication mandatory among light vehicles, a measure that could lead to safer roads.

Vehicle-to-vehicle, or V2V, communication allows cars to share data including speeds and brake applications with nearby cars. That data can then help warn drivers about possible collisions. For instance, if one car turns a corner and unexpectedly slams on the brakes, that car could communicate the action to nearby vehicles, which could then warn their drivers.
The technology would be used only to share information affecting safety, the DoT emphasized. It would not be used to collect personal data or for location tracking.
The technology could be especially useful in preventing common crashes such as rear-end or lane-change collisions, the DoT said.


V2V connectivity has been tested extensively; a program in Ann Arbor, Mich., deployed close to 3,000 vehicles in the largest road test of the technology.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration plans to release a report on its analysis of some of that testing and a year-long pilot program for V2V communication technology, which will provide more details about its technical feasibility, costs and safety benefits.
The NHTSA will then begin the process of drafting a proposal for a regulation that would make it mandatory in new vehicles in a "future year."

Waiting for Green Light

Like any advancement in technology, the implementation of V2V communications likely will be gradual, said Tsiotras.
"The main issues will be reliability of the technology and, most importantly, also the issue of mixing vehicles -- having this technology with vehicles that lack the ability to communicate with other vehicles," he explained.
"It will take some time before all the vehicles will have this capability," Tsiotras observed. "Till then, I think that the focus will be mainly on the use of the V2V technology for traffic regulation purposes. Collision avoidance will follow afterwards."