technology,” he added. Currently, only alerts are being provided to motorists.
The program is the first step toward the approximately 400,000 active school buses in the U.S. being outfitted with C-V2X technology, where either older buses will be retrofitted with on-board units or new buses will come standard with the technology, Vorster shared.
Seeking Priority Access, Speed Reduction Meanwhile, Applied Information has an application
to give school buses priority at traffic signals, noted Bill Wells, vice president of communications and strategy. The company conducted its Connected Vehicle Stu- dent Safety Pilot program last spring with Blue Bird and IC Bus to demonstrate that school buses with green lights at traffic signals offer improvements in travel time, enhanced student safety, fuel consumption, and a reduction in harmful emissions with the demonstrated improvements in overall efficiency as well as address the critical nationwide bus driver shortage. Data was collected from two Fulton County School
System buses—one diesel and one propane—as they served students in Alpharetta, Georgia. Applied Infor- mation C-V2X technology enabled the school buses to request green light priority at 62 traffic signals along their respective routes However, Fulton County Schools is not planning to
actively pursue the technology, with full support lacking from the school board, said Trey Stow, director of trans- portation operations for the district. Meanwhile, HAAS Alert’s digital alerting platform
Safety Cloud is a C-V2X solution using everyday cellular networks to deliver real-time roadway hazard alerts to drivers directly inside their vehicles. “Our alerts are delivered through Stellantis-brand
vehicles, including Jeep, Dodge, Ram, Chrysler, and Alfa Romeo vehicles as well as navigation apps like Waze and Apple Maps,” said Brock Aun, HAAS Alert vice president of communications. HAAS Alert is working on a Safety Cloud project with
the U.S. Department of Transportation to develop digital alerting for school buses, which would prevent colli- sions with school buses and protect children by alerting drivers via real-time safety notifications as they’re ap- proaching buses actively loading or unloading students. The goal of the project is to fully commercialize digital alerting for the school bus market so it can be deployed and adopted at scale, said Aun. “Given the significant risk of collisions, injuries, and
deaths on the road today, the need for safety-focused V2X solutions has never been more urgent,” he add- ed, pointing out pedestrian deaths in the U.S. are at
48 School Transportation News • MAY 2023
a 40-year high against the backdrop of increasingly distracted driving. “The rapid adoption of digital alerting nationwide, particularly in the public safety sector, has motivated agencies like the [U.S. Department of Trans- portation] to bring the solution to other segments and vehicles that would also benefit.” While logistical and financial V2X deployment in after-
market or new vehicle installation presents a challenge, “unlike other V2X solutions that require technologies communicating on dedicated spectrum for vehi- cle-to-vehicle communications, Safety Cloud digital alerts utilize existing cellular networks,” noted Aun. Another C-V2X application for school buses is ad- vanced intelligent speed assist that automatically and in real time manages vehicle speeds according to posted speed limits. MAGTEC’s SafeSpeed, for instance, pro- vides drivers additional time and space to help prevent all crash types and limits vehicle speeds in cases of med- ical events or pedal misapplication. Its use is designed to reduce auto liability claims and insurance premiums, lower fuel consumption, vehicle maintenance and carbon footprint. SafeSpeed can also safely disable a moving vehicle
during a hijacking, driver impairment or erratic driving events. Gary Catapano, chief strategy and safety advisor for MAGTEC Products, noted modern speed limiters are an application of advanced driver assistance systems. Intelligent speed assistance (ISA) technology helps a school bus driver operate the bus within the posted speed limit. “Eighty percent of the time, school buses operate in
communities where the roadway is shared in neighbor- hoods that sometimes don’t have sidewalks and where children and cyclists are on those roadways,” he added. Catapano concurred that such technologies help
achieve Vision Zero. “It’s not a case of Big Brother wanting control,” Cata- pano said. “It’s a case of wanting drivers to go home to their families safely at the end of each day and recogniz- ing the driver as the most important part of that journey to and from school, keeping them safely in the driver’s seat as well as protecting the passengers and everybody in the community on the roadways with them.” One of MAGTEC’s pilots in New York City has been expanded to include school buses. “The SafeSpeed technology has proven itself to be
99-percent effective in ensuring drivers operate at the speed that’s governed by the technology,” Catapano said. New York City municipal fleet drivers were carefully trained in a way that allowed them to understand and embrace the technology to help keep the streets a safer place to drive, he added. ●
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