Drivewyze has announced a new partnership with Inrix to bring real-time dangerous slowdown, queue alerts, and road closure information to truck drivers operating the Drivewyze Connected Truck platform.
Leveraging Inrix Dangerous Slowdowns, Drivewyze is able to convey safety events at a highly granular level to provide maximum reaction time for commercial truck drivers in a first-of-its-kind, always on, safety notification service.
According to Brian Mofford, VP of government experience for Drivewyze, this will have a significant impact since Drivewyze has integrated with partner devices deployed in more than two million large trucks, representing the single largest in-cab software reach in the trucking industry.
“We’re leveraging two premier platforms to pro-actively provide critical safety information to drivers,” says Mofford. “Safety Notifications is a new service delivered on the same connected truck platform as PreClear, North America’s largest weigh station bypass service. By integrating Inrix Dangerous Slowdowns, we can now work with states to bring real-time slowdown and queue alerts to commercial truck drivers.”
According to Mofford, rounding a corner on an interstate to find traffic crawling can be a nightmare for truck drivers with 80,000 pounds of weight behind them. “It takes 66% longer for a truck to stop as compared to a car,” he says. “But truck drivers can be ready for that scenario when an in-cab warning is given in advance. That’s why we’re so excited about partnering with Inrix and working with state DOTs in bringing this service at no cost to commercial truck drivers. This type of alert is the first in the industry – it’s proactive versus passive. Drivewyze is able to geo-fence the Inrix data on slowdowns to enable in-cab alerts when a slowdown is detected within two to three miles of the truck. Then, when the slowdown is imminent, we give another alert displaying ‘Caution: Dangerous Slowdown Ahead.’ This will save lives.”
“With advanced algorithms analyzing anonymous real-time sources traveling more than a billion miles daily in the US, Inrix can provide traffic movement information that is invaluable to truckers on interstates,” said Rick Schuman, vice president, public sector Americas, for Inrix. “It’s exciting to partner with Drivewyze to offer states meaningful safety information to commercial drivers. We expect DOTs will be as enthusiastic about the opportunity as we are.”
According to Mofford, commercial drivers typically have navigation systems on board, and they show colour gradients for traffic along a route. “But, according to surveys, 65% of drivers only use the system during the first and last mile of the pick-up and delivery,” he said. “That means the majority of drivers don’t know a slowdown is coming on an interstate, which can increase the chances of a collision. In comparison, our system is always on – giving drivers the advanced warning they need to slow their vehicles down.”
Accidents on interstates represent nearly 30% of all collisions, and many are secondary crashes where a truck or car rear-ended a vehicle that was in a queue from the initial crash. A Pennsylvania DOT study showed 82% of secondary crashes occurred more than 15 minutes after the initial crash, and 49% occurred over an hour later.
The new service is available to all states and can operates across the entire US Interstate System. Already, Inrix has added a new Commercial Vehicle Safety Alerts option to its master contract under the I-95 Corridor Coalition’s Vehicle Probe Project, allowing 18 states along the eastern seaboard to contract for this turnkey service via the Coalition.
