The Korea Transportation Safety Authority (TS) announced on the 14th that it will establish a bus operation environment for public safety by utilizing artificial intelligence (AI) video analysis technology to warn bus drivers of dangerous driving behaviors such as signal violations and drowsy driving.
To this end, the Korea Transportation Safety Authority will sign a business agreement with the National Bus Transport Business Association at 2 PM on the 15th in the conference room on the 6th floor of the National Bus Association to prevent traffic accidents caused by violations of laws and dangerous driving behaviors by bus drivers.
Through this business agreement, the Korea Transportation Safety Authority plans to promote the Real-time Operation Control Monitoring of Route Buses Using the AI Safe Driving Platform Project with the National Bus Transport Business Association to prevent bus accidents and apply it to route buses.
This project was introduced in Korea last year and highlights the government’s national tasks of managing the safety of commercial vehicles and digitizing safety management systems, expanding the scope to include not only city buses but also express and intercity buses.
The Korea Transportation Safety Authority will carry out the project at regional headquarters across the country, including Seoul, Southern Gyeonggi, Daejeon-Sejong-Chungnam, and Daegu-Gyeongbuk.
According to the performance analysis of last year’s AI City Bus Safe Driving Monitoring Pilot Project, key violations such as signal violations decreased by 71.4%, centerline violations by 10.6%, forward-looking behavior by 33.3%, and smoking by 86.9%.
In particular, when dangerous driving behaviors such as signal violations, mobile phone use, smoking, failure to wear seat belts, and near accidents occurred, they were automatically stored in the AI safe driving platform and actively used for education and guidance, targeting drivers who violated regulations at the transportation companies.
As a result, it was found that the traffic accident rate of the relevant city bus companies (464 people at 2 companies) decreased by 93.5% (0.123→0.008 cases/vehicle), indicating a significant project effect.
The Korea Transportation Safety Authority plans to expand the scale of the Safe Driving Monitoring Project Using the AI Safe Driving Platform, which has a significant effect on improving dangerous driving by 5 to 8 times compared to the previous year, targeting 10 to 16 route bus companies, including express, wide area, intercity, and city buses.
First of all, AI cameras will be installed inside and outside of the buses of the participating transportation companies, and the driver’s dangerous driving behaviors will be monitored in real-time through image analysis equipment. During monitoring, when serious violations such as signal violations, centerline violations, mobile phone use, drowsy driving, and forward-looking behavior occur, an alarm immediately sounds from the AI terminal.
After monitoring, dangerous driving behaviors such as overspeeding, sudden stops, and sudden starts, accident videos (emergencies, accidents, near accidents), and more are provided to drivers and transportation companies through the safe driving platform for use in driver correction education.
The Korea Transportation Safety Authority also implements a reward for excellent drivers worth 200 million won ($168,000) to increase the voluntary participation of drivers in safe driving through real-time operation control monitoring.
Kwon Yong Bok, the head of the Korea Transportation Safety Authority, said, “Through this project, we expect bus drivers to be able to improve their dangerous driving habits, such as violations of laws and dangerous driving behaviors on their own,” and added, “Through this, a safe and convenient public transportation environment will be provided to the public who rides buses.”