Product Spotlight - SafePace 550

Hey, What's the Speed Limit Around Here? On roads where speed limits change, it can be hard for drivers to remember, or keep track of different speed limits. Whether entering a school zone, an area where construction is taking place, or just moving from business to residential streets, drivers encounter shifting speed limits every day. Do they notice? No matter how prominently a speed limit sign is displayed, drivers may not notice changed limits, inadvertently putting children, workers, and pedestrians at risk. How Are Speed Limits Decided? The most obvious and most decisive aspect in deciding speed limits is safety. There is a simple statistical relationship between speed of vehicles and severity of crashes. In areas where pedestrians are more likely to be present, such as students walking to school, construction workers repaving a roadway, or children riding bikes outside their homes, lower speed limits can mean the difference between life and death. In addition, the speed of vehicles has been shown to be directly impacted by speed limits. Making Sure People Notice If speed limits are so crucial to driver and pedestrian safety, how can cities make sure they are more prominent so that drivers are more likely to notice them? Today’s distracted, electronically stimulateddrivers may not notice a changed speed limit sign on the side of the road. However, variable speed limit signs such as the SafePace 550 display speed limits in brightly lit LEDs, which are far more visually stimulating than simple black on white numbers.    What if They Miss it?  The digits on the SafePace 550 sign flash at drivers who exceed the selected speed limit. An included strobe light offers additional warning to speeders that the speed limit has changed. Signs can be programmed to display speed limits based on time of day, week, or month so that drivers always know exactly what the speed limit is. Simple to program and manage from anywhere via the SafePace Cloud, the SafePace 550 ensures that drivers are sure to notice and observespeed limits on your roads.

Safer Roads and Aging Population

Safer Roads and Aging Population Aging Driving Population With growing life expectancy and more active older adults than ever, America’s driving population is aging. Driving patterns change for older drivers as retirement changes schedules and age related declines in vision, hearing and overall wellness can affect driving skills. While average drivers who are 65 or over are actually more likely to be safe drivers than younger counterparts, with a lifetime of driving experience behind them, some elderly drivers are at risk of increased injuries and fatalities to themselves and others when they are behind the wheel. How Safe are They? For the most recent year that data was available, NHTSA  reports that 17% of all traffic fatalities in the US involved people 65 and over. This age group accounts for 14% of the total US population. The number of licensed drivers in the US increased a whopping 27% in the past ten years. The NIH reports that elderly drivers are the least likely to be involved in crashes involving alcohol or speeding but are more likely to get into accidents at intersections and when merging, both situations in where other drivers may be going faster and have quicker reflexes.  Safer Road for All Many engineers, cyclists, pedestrians, and health professionals advocate for Complete Streets. When we think of streets that offer safe access to all users, we often think of motorists, cyclists, and pedestrians. However, the elderly population, who comprise 44.7 million people in the US, need to be considered as well. Whether that means incorporating more speed control devices such as speed humps so that younger drivers don’t speed in areas frequented by slower driving seniors, having longer crossing times for seniors who may be using canes or wheelchairs, or using speed indicator signs to remind elderly drivers of their speeds and ensure they are alert, safer streets for all need to take all ages into account. Resources for Improved Safety Hearing, vision, reaction time, and physical changes affect different people at different ages. Ultimately, as the NIH points out, it’s a person’s health, and not their age, that determines their ability to continue driving safely. An elderly person is more likely to suffer from conditions such as diabetes, arthritis, dementia, stroke, or Parkinson’s disease, all of which can affect one’s ability to drive safely. The NIH website features videos of what it’s like to drive with each of these conditions to offer insight to drivers and their family members. It’s important to remember that the most fundamental component of safer roads is safe drivers.

When Safe Roads Become Unsafe

On roads where there are generally not safety concerns, weather can present unique challenges. With increased friction in bad weather, vehicles are more likely to travel too fast and collisions become more frequent.

In the city of Lethbridge, ON, the municipality used the SafePace 550 variable speed limit sign to simply change the speed limit in bad weather. The SafePace 550 displays the speed limit and can be programmed to change based on weather reports or even in the moment when weather takes an unexpected turn for the worse.

The signs were installed on a roadways with average daily traffic of 50,000 vehicles and a long history of weather related collisions including multi car pileups.

The SafePace 550 was used in conjunction with the SafePace Cloud to program the sign remotely as well as to gather data and record traffic statistics. The sign proved a powerful tool in lowering vehicle speed limits, and remarkably, there were no collisions reported at all during weather events when the speed was reduced.

Read the full story here.