IIIT-H’s initiative iRaste Project gets global recognition

Hyderabad, November 6, 2023: IIIT Hyderabad and its Applied Artificial Intelligence Research Centre (INAI)’s iRaste project has been cited in the International Road Federation (IRF) India Chapter’s prestigious 2023 annual yearbook.
 
The International Road Federation is a global not-for-profit organization, headquartered in Washington, DC since 1948 and supported by regional offices throughout the world to serve a network of IRF Members in more than 70 countries.
 
The section of the book on “Driver behaviour improvement with collision avoidance systems”  cites the work underway under iRaste project (INAI and iHub-Data), where 340 buses in Nagpur city and 200 buses in Telangana inter-city routes have been fitted with collision warning sensors; anytime a near-accident (collision avoided) incident occurs the data is logged
 
All data is analysed to identify grey and blackspots on accident-prone roads, and jointly with Central Road Research Institute, these grey spots are analysed to identify ways to reduce collision warning situations. To eventually reduce road accidents and fatalities. 
 
The first pilot phase of the project, popularly referred to as Project Telangana – 20 or ts20, which has been featured in the IRF yearbook is a project on road safety conducted in the city of Hyderabad, in Telangana, using Collision Avoidance Systems (CAS) installed in a fleet of vehicles. The objective of this project was to study the impact of collision alert systems on driver behaviour. The vehicles in this project operated on the roads of Hyderabad and were observed over six months. The project included two phases – a control period, where drivers were observed to set a baseline performance of driving behaviour, followed by an observation period, where the change in performance was observed against the baseline performance. This report presents the findings and data analysis from the study. It was observed that the presence of a CAS system changed the behaviour of 54% of drivers on average to adopt safer driving behaviour, and among those drivers who changed behaviour, the average improvement in driving behaviour was about 34%. From the analysis and results on various aspects of the study, it was concluded that the use of a collision avoidance system leads to a change in behaviour – improved safer driving among drivers. This study paved the way for the iRASTE project - presently ongoing, large-scale ADAS based road safety project with over 350 vehicles in India.
 
The yearbook is a seminal compilation of major initiatives across the country around roads and road safety and is actively connected to the Ministry of Road Transport and other government agencies. The International Road Federation as an organization has a formidable reputation for its work in the field of Road Safety. Its past work has helped provide important inputs for shaping our road policies. The IRF India Chapter yearbook 2023 on Safe Roads & Safe Mobility will influence a large number of people to come forward and contribute to the cause of Road Safety. This will be an enabler to reduce fatalities on the roads.
 
Commenting on the validation of their research by a reputable entity such as the International Road Federation (IRF), Prof C V Jawahar, Dean, R&D IIITH said, “"We are happy that our TS-20 study on the effectiveness of ADAS systems, first of its kind in India, using real data from 20 vehicles and drivers covering half-a-million kilometres in 6 months, has been featured in the IRF Yearbook 2023. This study paved the way for the iRASTE project - presently ongoing, large-scale ADAS-based road safety project with over 350 vehicles in India."