Month: July 2024
The new EU road fatalities interactive infographic of the NTUA Road Safety Observatory, based on European Commission CARE data for 2023, allows for performance comparisons for different types of road crashes. It is demonstrated that disaggregate data can reveal hidden road safety problems, allowing national Authorities to focus on targeted road safety countermeasures. 
The 11th International Conference on Vehicle Technology and Intelligent Transport Systems (VEHITS) took place with great success as a hybrid event in Porto, on 2-4 April 2025. The purpose of this conference was to bring together engineers, researchers and practitioners interested in the advances and applications in the field of Vehicle Technology and Intelligent Transport Systems. This conference covered areas such as Connected Vehicles, Data Analytics, Intelligent Transport Systems and Infrastructure, Intelligent Vehicle Technologies and Smart Mobility and Sustainable Transport Services. 
A paper titled “Unfolding the dynamics of driving behavior: a machine learning analysis from Germany and Belgium” authored by Stella Roussou, Eva Michelaraki, Christos Katrakazas, Amir Pooyan Afghari, Christelle Al Haddad, Md Rakibul Alam, Constantinos Antoniou, Eleonora Papadimitriou, Tom Brijs and George Yannis has been published in European Transport Research Review. Thirty German drivers’ trips and Forty-Three Belgian drivers were analyzed using Long-Short-Term-Memory Networks and shallow Neural Networks, revealing factors contributing to risky behavior. Results indicate i-DREAMS interventions significantly enhance driving behavior, with Neural Networks displaying superior performance among the algorithms considered. 
The Horizon 2020 research project PHOEBE has recently released the PHOEBE 3rd Newsletter, which provides information on the latest outcomes of the EU-funded ‘Predictive Approaches for Safer Urban Environment’ (PHOEBE) project aiming to increase the road safety of vulnerable road users, especially those who use active mobility and e-scooters. Special focus is given to the assessment of current mobility pilot plans in Athens, carried out by NTUA.
A paper titled “Safety evaluation via conflict classification during automated shuttle bus service operations” authored by Apostolos Ziakopoulos, Maria Oikonomou, Marios Sekadakis and George Yannis has been published in European Transport Research Review. To investigate impacts of autonomous shuttle bus services and to further examine their operational speed, the microscopic simulation method was performed. By analyzing the trajectory data extracted from microsimulation, traffic conflicts were identified and further analyzed by developing Mixed-Effects Multinomial Logit Regression models (ME-MLMs) in order to associate conflict type taking into account network characteristics as well as traffic conditions. The analysis yielded several significant findings that provide quantitative measurements and assessments of the effects observed, enabling a better understanding of the safety implications associated with the widespread adoption of automated services.
